Meg Lacey - A Noble Pursuit

Frantic to join her now, to revel in her heat, Shay tore off his shirt and unsnapped his jeans, helped by her eager hands. She yanked the denim down, but the fabric stopped at his ankles, caught on his gun.

Shay swore. He sat up and made quick work of his loafers and holster. Yanking his jeans off, he threw them across the room, followed by his briefs, before turning back to her. He was so hard he was afraid he’d break if she touched him. She was staring at him as if she’d never seen a man in full arousal before. There was something in her eyes that checked him for a moment, an awkwardness that he found enchanting. She was like a barely opened flower offering its face to the morning dew and warming sun. He hated the thought that someone might mishandle this woman. He didn’t know why that thought leaped into his mind. He had no reason to think she might be in any danger, other than the memory loss that could be a result of—of what? He had no chance to follow up on his thoughts.

She put her hands on him, her fingers sliding up his manhood to gently squeeze the sensitive head. “You’re so soft. I didn’t know a man could be so soft.” Wonder colored her voice.

Shay groaned as her fingers slipped up and down his length. “I’m so hard I’m gonna explode.”

“Now that would be something to see.”

He stilled her hand with his. “No, sweetheart. It’s better you should feel it.”

She smiled, anticipation sharpening the angles of her face. “Then what are you waiting for?”

Shay came up on his elbows and reached toward the nightstand. Opening a drawer, he withdrew a small foil packet and quickly protected them both before reaching for her again. “Not a damn thing.”

He took his time, bringing her up to fever pitch again, until she cried with the wanting. Then and only then did he slip inside her. He pressed forward, inch by inch, stunned by the tightness of her body, by the barrier he felt. Alarmed for a moment, he stopped and tried to pull back, but her legs clamped him in place, heels urging him on. Clarity faded, leaving only the crimson flame of desire. He gave…and he took…until finally they shuddered to a climax together.

Afterward he smoothed her hair back from her face.

“Thank you,” she said.

Shay grinned. “No, thank you.”

She met his grin with a wistful expression, her eyes serious. “I’ll never forget this moment.”

He yawned and settled her comfortably against his side. “There’ll be a lot more to remember, I promise. I just need to close my eyes for a minute.” Sexual satisfaction combined with an early rising and a long, frustrating day were taking their toll. His eyelids drifted shut for a moment before he jerked them open to look at her face. He smiled again, then pressed a kiss on her forehead. “Rest, sweetheart—” he interrupted himself with a jaw-popping yawn. “—’cause pretty soon you’re gonna need all your strength again.”

She blew on his eyelids. “Go to sleep.”

“Right,” he mumbled.

Her voice caressed him as he slid into sleep. “Sweet dreams… Prince Charming.”

Shay woke just before dawn. Arms aching and empty, he reached for her, just as he’d reached for her a few hours before to make love with her again. This time the bed beside him was empty. There was no trace of the woman with no memory. No trace except for his inevitable erection, her evocative scent on the pillow next to him, and her memory burned into his mind.

AT FOUR IN THE MORNING, Juliette had been lucky to find an empty taxi still cruising the streets looking for Mardi Gras stragglers. Agreeing to let her send him his fee and a big tip for the inconvenience of bringing her home, which was much farther from town than he usually ventured, the cab driver dropped her off at the wrought-iron gates that spanned the entrance to La Belle Rivière des Fleurs. Juliette walked up the magnolia-lined driveway that led to her family home, taking care to stay in the shadows so as not to be observed.

The plantation had been in their family for a very long time, passed from father to son. Heritage, tradition—this was the way of life revered by her ancestors since the beginning. Her privileged family heritage went all the way back to 1807, when her titled Spanish great-great-great-great-grandmother married a bastard French prince who’d been awarded land in New Orleans in addition to his French estates. Each generation sacrificed and struggled to add to the family fortunes, to the family luster. It was just unfortunate, Juliette thought, that she could be the latest sacrifice.

She stopped in the shadow of a weeping willow tree and stared at her home, taking in the classic columns that accented the mansion, supporting the second-story gallery and creating the wide veranda that wrapped around the perfect example of Greek Revival plantation architecture. Or so the guidebooks said. She wondered what Shay would make of it. Would he be impressed? He hadn’t seemed the type of man to be overly impressed with things. People either, for that matter. He took them as he found them, Juliette believed. How did he find her? Would he care that she’d left? Or would he be convinced that she’d made a fool of him, and write her off?

Of course that’s what he’d do.

Her romantic stranger wasn’t really a warrior prince. He was just a normal man who’d had a brief affair that would fade from his memory in a week, while it would last forever in hers. Juliette glanced up at her home again. Much as she’d always loved it, home had begun to feel like a prison.

She crept around to the back of the house and slipped inside the kitchen door. The room was dark, lit only by strips of moonlight spilling through the windows. She tiptoed over to a corner and opened a door to the servants’ stairs. This wasn’t the first time she’d used them, but it was certainly the first time she’d used them after an experience like this. Taking care to avoid the last step, which always creaked, Juliette emerged into the second-story hallway. Leaning against the wall for a moment, she looked down the corridor, focusing on the rich, ruby-red carpeting and the crystal lamps that accented the damask wallpaper. The effect was opulent, yet tasteful—two adjectives that adequately described her life. Not for the first time that evening, she wanted to scream at the confining nature of her existence. However, her upbringing held sway. Screaming was discouraged. It wasn’t appropriate behavior. Although she’d recently screamed her head off in Shay’s arms as she’d succumbed to her first night of passion—loving every minute of it.

With a quick glimpse around to be sure she was unobserved, Juliette sped over the thick carpet to her room, which occupied an end suite off the corridor. She let herself in with a minimum of noise, then leaned back to relish her triumph. She’d managed to experience a true adventure—one even more exciting than she could have dreamed—and no one would ever be the wiser. Her brother would have assumed she’d gone to bed early, as she’d indicated she would when she left the restaurant. And there would have been no one to tell him differently, as her father had left last month for the family’s estate in France to personally handle a crisis involving his vineyards. With no one at home that evening, she’d followed her usual practice and even given the servants the night off. So her secret was safe.

Juliette walked over to her four-poster bed, the bed she’d occupied ever since she was a child. She ran her fingertips over the carved upright posts that stretched to the ceiling, and fingered the ivory silk quilt that spilled over the mattress to pool onto the carpet beneath. It looked different to her now. The last time she’d slept in this bed, she’d been an innocent. Well, she was innocent no longer. She was no longer a virgin, but a full-fledged woman, who’d not only experienced passion, but reveled in it.