Catherine Lanigan - The Texan

“My grandfather?” Rafe asked dispassionately. “Yes. Nearly everything of value was his. But I’ve adopted his philosophy.”

Angela touched the delicate handmade lace canopy, thinking it felt lighter than an angel’s wing. “Which is?”

“Things are meaningless...” He stopped in midsentence as Angela raised her face to him. At that moment she had that same faraway soft look in her eyes as she’d had the night they’d met. He didn’t know what it was about her when she looked at him like that, but it was compelling and he thought he would lose his mind if he didn’t touch her, hold her, kiss her...just one more time.

She hadn’t realized he’d moved so close and when she looked up at him she was still thinking about the people who’d made love in this bed, creating their children and preserving their family for the future. She was unprepared for the touch of his hand against her cheek.

With his thumb he brushed away a lone tear that fell from her eye. “You’re crying,” he said, without asking for an explanation. “I know why. Every time I walk into this room, I can feel the enormity of loneliness in the world. You feel it, too, don’t you?”

“Yes,” she answered. How could he feel her spirit so effortlessly?

He kissed her delicately as if she were the most fragile of porcelains. He cupped her face with his strong, callused hands making it impossible for her to turn away from him. Logical thoughts loomed in a faraway distance, but they had no place in this world of emotion and overpowering physical passion. Rafe was responding just as eagerly to her. How was it he could be so utterly cold one moment and then instantly transform into this inferno of desire? Which was the real side of Rafe Whitten?

Angela placed her hands tenderly over his. She knew she should push him away and keep their discussion on the business at hand. But all she knew was that if she didn’t let herself experience this man right here, right now, she might regret it for the rest of her life.

Never before had Angela abandoned herself to a man she barely knew, much less one she knew in her heart didn’t want her. Though Rafe Whitten was moved by the moment, remembering a family who’d obviously left him as alone in the world as she was, her mind told her that when the kiss was over she would never feel his lips on hers again. He’d tell her that he regretted his impulsiveness; that he didn’t want to get or be “involved” or “committed” to anyone. Angela had heard those words from men all her life. She’d never understood what it was about her that frightened them away. Perhaps in some deep way, she pushed them away, her inner self always knowing that none of them had truly been the right one.

Angela would be kind when he wanted to back away because she knew, as always, it would be for the best.

But for right now, it was as if they were suspended between time and space, hung in a netherworld of ghosts and dreams where the past met the present.

It wasn’t curiosity that caused her to open her eyes, but a yearning to have more of him. As if reading her thoughts, slowly he opened his eyes at the same time. It was the first time she’d see him without his icy self-protective shields. His eyes were like crystal blue ponds and as she dove into him, she began to understand what it was like to touch someone’s soul.

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