Forbidden Dreams Read online

  Still, she couldn’t keep her gaze from straying to his hard mouth, his determined chin. A vertical two-inch scar, no wider than a fine-tip pen mark, bisected one cheek, giving him a piratical air. His overlong black hair had not a trace of gray in it, and fell across a broad brow. Deep grooves that she recognized as having more to do with suffering than with age had been carved between his mouth and nose.

  The depth and wistfulness of her sigh surprised her.

  As if he had heard it, he opened his eyes again, glaring now with irritation. “Jeeze, woman, shut the damned window!” His teeth chattered as he wrapped his arms around himself. “It’s colder than a whore’s heart in here!”

  “Such a colorful vocabulary,” she said, toweling him dry, rubbing briskly over his arms and shoulders before drawing the quilt up to his chin. She hadn’t meant to freeze him, merely to cool his fever. It appeared, though, she thought with relief, that she’d also cooled his ardor.

  Or had she?

  He tossed the quilt back. “Come to bed, honey,” he said, startling her again with the clarity of his gaze as it locked itself on her eyes. A suggestive smile played seductively over his lips. He patted the mattress. “Let’s keep each other warm.”

  Firmly, Shell tucked the covers back around him. “No. Go to sleep.”

  His fingers clamped around her wrist. “Don’t leave me.” Once more, he was that intriguing blend of little boy and tough guy. At least it wasn’t difficult to twist her arm free.

  “I’ll stay until you’re asleep.” Because, she told herself, he might talk in his sleep and say something that would reveal who he was and what he wanted. She’d stay for that reason and that reason only.

  “Closer,” he said.

  She sat on the side of the bed near his knees. “This is close enough.”

  “Not nearly.”

  She gasped in surprise as his arms whipped out from under the quilt, shoving it back, and snaked around her, capturing her and pulling her up over his chest. In spite of the shivering, his skin burned against her. She gently extricated herself from his embrace, holding him down with one hand in the middle of his chest. He glared at her impotently for several moments before sighing and closing his eyes again.

  After a couple of minutes Shell thought he was deeply enough asleep for her to leave. She’d just begun easing herself off the side of his bed when he flung himself erect.

  His shout, “Carson!” as much as his galvanic jerking upright, frightened her half to death. She tried to push him down, but he was too strong for her now. His eyes were wide, glittering like wet black stones. He looked determined. He also looked demented. “Carson, cover me, I’m going in!”

  “Take it easy,” Shell said, trying to pin his shoulders. “Jason, don’t fight me, please. Lie down. You have to rest because you’re ill. I’m trying to help you.”

  He groaned long and low and despairingly, looking straight into her eyes with such loathing, she felt chilled. “You? You never helped me,” he said bitterly. “You left me! You turned me in.” He choked, squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, then opened them and stared at her. He clamped one hand onto the back of her head, fingers tangling in her hair. “Oh, God, Sharba, why?” he asked. “Why did you go?”

  “Jason, lie down. Please. Try to relax.”

  “Ahh, get the hell out of here,” he said, thrusting her away. “I don’t want you back.”

  “Okay, that’s fine. Just lie down and let me cover you.”

  Abruptly, his look of hatred was gone, replaced by one of pleading, of endless, depthless yearning that closed Shell’s throat with pain. He caught her by the elbows and held her before him, his voice low and grating as he said, “I don’t want you to go. But … how could I ever again trust you to stay with me? Could I ever believe in you again after what you did? You have to understand, Sharba. It can never be the same again for us, so go. Please, by all that’s merciful, get out, before I let the loneliness take over and beg you to come back …”

  His eyes closed. He fell silent, but didn’t let her go. Shell sat very still, waiting for his hands to relax in sleep, but abruptly his eyes popped open again. “Why?” His exhalation was short and abrupt, like a sob. “Please! I wanted you for so long … I waited and waited, and you never came back, so if you leave me now, I’ll …” His voice trailed away as he gazed at her, those coal-black eyes boring into hers, searching for answers that weren’t hers to give.

  He cupped her face then, drew her down to him, and took from her a kiss that also was not hers to give. Her head pressed to his chest, he rested his palm on her cheek. His fingers slid through her hair, tenderly, seductively, as if the feel of it so pleasured him, he couldn’t stop moving his skin against it.

  “Soft,” he murmured against her temple. “So soft, like black satin.”

  His head fell back onto the pillows while he continued to hold her. He stroked her cheek, his fingertips hard, callused, sending shivers of forbidden delight down her throat and chest to gather at and pucker her nipples. Her other cheek lay on the powerful muscles of his chest, and she drew in a long breath of his scent. He smelled clean and masculine, and the sound of his heart pounding steadily in her ear was as soothing as the feel of him, the scent of him, were disturbing.

  With a strength that amazed her, he suddenly lifted her fully onto the bed, rolling up and over her and pinning her to the mattress with his weight. Cupping her face in one hand, he kissed her again, this time demanding a response. Even as she fought not to give it, she succumbed to all the wild sensations that refused her denial.

  As Shell told herself that this was wrong, crazy, that Jason O’Keefe was a stranger who was sick with a fever and out of his mind, her heart told her that she had known him from the beginning of time and that this was as right as anything she had ever experienced.

  The heat of his fever burned her skin, and a different kind of heat grew within her, one that was all hers and building inexorably, glowing hotter and hotter. She tried to drag herself away before she got lost in the sensations of his smooth, hot tongue prodding her lips, before she gave way to the demands of his mouth. But needs she had suppressed for too long arose and weakened her, gave her muscles all the effectiveness of old rubber bands and melted her inner resolve. She slid an arm around his neck, touching his hair with uncertain fingers. Its springy thickness was a delight, and she filled her hand with it.

  The hard plunge of his tongue softened, and he coaxed and beguiled as heat built deep within her. She shuddered as his tongue flicked and teased, and his hands stroked over her, one gliding down her back to her waist, the other cradling her head as he held her securely. His hand trailed out of her hair, across her shoulder, and down to cup a breast, sending a shaft of desire straight through her.

  In response to her involuntary surge against him, he moaned, deepened the kiss, and then, almost as if he’d accomplished what he’d set out to do, he stopped. He eased his hold on her and let his lips trail over her cheek and down her neck. He slipped sideways, his head falling back onto the pillows. Asleep!

  Or passed out.

  Shell drew in a shuddering breath and somewhere found the strength to slide out from under his pinning weight. She sat on the floor beside the bed, clutching her arms around her middle and trying to catch her breath.

  “Shell,” he murmured, a limp hand draping over her hair. “Little Shell. Don’t go.”

  Shakily, she got to her knees and stared at him. What had he said?

  His eyes were closed. A soft snore arose from him. His skin, when she touched his shoulder, was cooler. He seemed calmer now, sleeping easily, no longer beset by nightmares.

  Inside her chest, though, her heart beat as rapidly as if she were running for her very life. At what point during that embrace had she ceased to be Sharba to him and become Shell?

  Presently, feeling chilled and even more frightened, she slipped out of his room and back to her own bed, completely forgetting her notion of staying there in case he said somet
hing revealing in his sleep. Oh, Lord, who was Jason O’Keefe? What did he want from her?

  Whatever it was, especially if it was information, he wouldn’t get it, she vowed, punching her pillow into shape. With Ned’s help she would make sure of that. She must.

  In the morning, she promised herself, she’d get the man out of her house and off Piney Point, if she had to piggyback him all the way to town. She’d be happier still when he was completely off the Sunshine Coast and back in California.

  She dozed fitfully for a couple of hours and awakened to watch the world turn gray. Tiptoeing to the door of O’Keefe’s room, she saw he still slept soundly, his chest rising and falling quickly, as if deep breaths were beyond his ability. She recalled the bruising. Did he have broken ribs?

  Soon, after dressing warmly for work in dark slacks and a red sweater, she had the fire burning brightly in the living room wood stove. Working quickly and quietly, she readied the old-fashioned percolator she used at times like these and set it on top of the warm stove.

  After shoving her feet into black boots, she grabbed a jacket and let Skeena out for an early morning run on the beach. Following the dog, she rounded the house to the front and mourned the loss of her arbutus tree far more than she mourned the loss of the sundeck.

  The ocean still ran high, swells creaming and frothing as they struck the shore of a distant islet, then booming with earthshaking thunder as they hammered in close to where she strode. But the sky was deep, brilliant blue, the breeze mild, and the sun actually bathed her with a faint warmth.

  The dog raced happily after a crow that teased it unmercifully by keeping always one short hop ahead. Shell smiled and told herself that her nighttime fears had been simply that, nighttime fears that the day had washed away. How could she be troubled when navy-blue water trimmed with white lace stretched all the way to where Vancouver Island, twenty-five miles to the west, thrust its white-capped peaks into the blue winter sky? Thin streamers of cloud streaked along above, catching the rays of the sun and making the entire world sparkle.

  Jason O’Keefe was no danger to her, or to her mother, or to their peace of mind. Even as the thought crossed her mind, she remembered his kiss. Shivering, she wrapped her arms around herself and whistled for Skeena to come back. That kiss, the one that might have been meant for another woman but also might have been meant for her, told her that he, whoever he was, could very well be a danger to her. The sooner she got him on his feet and on his way, the better off she’d be.

  The first step in that maneuver would be a big cup of strong, hot coffee to sharpen her wits, give her courage, and set her up for the day.

  Surely, it would be perked by now.

  Chapter Three

  SHELL HAD JUST WALKED back inside when she heard O’Keefe stumble from his room to the bathroom. By the time he emerged, she had her coffee poured and was reaching up to get a mug down for him. Hearing his soft, bare footfalls on the tile behind her, she forced herself to look over her shoulder and meet his gaze, and wondered if he could hear the loud hammering of her heart.

  She swept her gaze over him, the broad shoulders, muscular arms, and bruised chest visible above the green blanket wrapped high around his body. It parted as he took a halting step into the room, revealing the bandage she’d put on the night before. Blood had soaked through.

  “You’re a real mess,” she said. “I don’t know how you managed to get here, the shape you’re in.”

  He grinned a totally irresistible grin that made something very elemental flip over inside her.

  “Hell, honey,” he drawled. “A man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do.”

  Shell had to laugh at the put-on John Wayne intonation. “I see. You’re just a natural born hero, are you?”

  Abruptly, she was all tangled up in the memory of his strong arms holding her, of that hot kiss in the dark night. Warmth stung her cheeks as she wondered if he had any recollection of it.

  Again, she swept her gaze over his blanket wrapped shape, swallowing hard at the sight of his sleep-tousled hair and the full day’s growth of beard on his face. Her skin tingled as she remembered the feel of that beard. He was handsome, virile, and disturbing on more than one front. She was going to have to stay on her guard, not let him see that he scared her. Vultures and sharks attacked the vulnerable; the only protection was strength.

  “Go back to bed,” she said briskly, pouring coffee from the heavy percolator. “I’ll bring your coffee to your room, where you’ll be warmer: It’s still too cold out here for you. What do you take in it?”

  Instead of obeying, he limped the rest of the way into the kitchen and pulled out a wooden chair. “Both,” he said, sinking onto it. He winced, sticking his sore leg out before him as if unable or unwilling to bend it.

  She set his cup on the table, along with powdered creamer and sugar. “You shouldn’t be up,” she said but dragged another chair closer and lifted his foot onto it.

  She poured him a glass of apple juice and set it beside his coffee. “How’s the pain?” she asked, picking up his pill bottle.

  His gesture indicated he didn’t want any. “It’s not too bad.” He took a healthy gulp of the juice. “They’re for migraines, but they seem to have worked on the rest of the agony too. Apart from a few dull aches, I feel pretty well human so long’s I don’t try to breathe too deep. Probably got some bruised ribs or something.”

  “Or something,” she agreed. “Now, suppose you—” tell me who you are and what you want, she had been about to say, but he let the blanket slide down several inches, and she broke off, gasping as even worse purple bruising was revealed.

  He prodded experimentally with blunt fingertips. “Nothing’s broken. I’m pretty sure of that.”

  “How can you be?” He’d looked bad enough the night before. Today he looked as if he’d been sent through a log peeler. “I’d still like to have a doctor look you over. If you feel up to traveling by car, I’ll take you into town with me when I go to work and drop you off at the emergency room. Otherwise, I’ll have to send an ambulance for you.”

  His black eyebrows drew together. “I don’t need a doctor, and I’m not going to any emergency room. Besides, unless there’s another road out onto this point, I’m not going anywhere and neither are you. The road I came in on is washed out. That’s what happened to me. I drove smack into a river as I came around a bend and had to fight my way out of the wreck of my Jeep.”

  “River?” Shell frowned and bit her lip. She remembered he’d said something about a washout, and he had arrived soaking wet, and yes, the creek could turn into a river during a deluge. “That must mean the bridge is out. Damn! We lost it a few years ago in another storm, and it took them nearly a week to get it replaced.”

  She paced to the front window where the wet leaves still pressed against the glass, then back toward Jason O’Keefe. She picked up the phone, but there was still no dial tone. She slammed it down. “Dammit, I have to get to work!”

  “I’m sorry,” he said, as if somehow the washout had been his fault. “Are you a nurse?”

  She blinked in surprise. “No. I own a bookstore.”

  For an instant she thought she saw a flicker of wariness in his eyes. “Oh.” He shoved the edge of the blanket back from his leg and looked down at the dressing. “I wondered.” He glanced up, and whatever she had seen was gone, leaving his expression bland. “You did a pretty good job on me last night.”

  “I … took a home-nursing course once, and Industrial First-Aid,” she said, frowning at the blood-soaked bandage. Surely, it needed to be changed if infection was to be avoided. And it was, at all costs, because she wanted this man mobile enough to ford the stream when it went down, and to hike the mile and a half to the highway so he could hitch a ride into town. Whatever his reason for being on Piney Point, she didn’t want him to tarry. She shouldn’t even change his dressing. Putting it on in the first place had been first-aid; changing it was tantamount to practicing medicine without a lic
ense, but under the circumstances, what choice was there?

  Collecting her first-aid kit, she set it on the table, then strode to the sink to wash her hands. They trembled under the stream of lukewarm water, which was all that was left in the hot water tank after a night without power.

  What is the matter with you? she asked herself and gave her head a quick shake. She was simply going to change his dressing, the same one she’d put on his thigh the night before. That was nothing to get agitated over, was it? But … he’d kissed her, held her, stroked his big hands over her, and somehow that changed everything, made the mere idea of touching him a threat to her equilibrium.

  Squaring her shoulders, she dried her hands on a clean towel and lectured herself. Okay, so he’d kissed her, and held her, and caressed her, and she’d responded much too readily. But that had been last night. Today things would be different. She had only to make it so.

  Yet her fingers still trembled.

  Jase watched Shell, smiling as he recalled the small, earnest face of the child who had said to him, “My name’s not really Shell. It’s Shirley Elizabeth Landry, but I can’t say that, so I say Shell.” He’d laughed at her then, and laughed with her many times. When their summer together was over, he’d let her fade from his memory, not remembering her until he’d come across an old photograph with her name written on the back.

  Now he admired the way she’d grown up. He liked the fit of her navy slacks over her nicely rounded rump, the way they tightened around her shapely thighs as she walked. Still, his mind searched for remnants of the girl he had known, for Shell Landry the adult was not what he’d expected, despite the newspaper picture he’d seen a couple of weeks ago. Tall and slim, with the same pale green eyes he remembered, she exuded confidence one moment and looked frail and vulnerable the next. She couldn’t be called pretty. Her features were too strong for that, too much personality showed through, but she was most assuredly attractive. Her scarlet sweater gave her skin a lovely glow, and her stunning pale hair was tied carelessly at her nape with a paisley scarf.