Must Love Mistletoe

Chapter 9

Perhaps it was the highlights in her hair that brightened Tracy’s outlook. The new cut that fluffed around her face to end in soft wisps at her jawline. Or maybe it was the sunshine streaming through the downstairs window and the promise of another seventy-something-degree day. For whatever reason, she found herself with her hand on the front door. For the first time in weeks, she walked out into the sunlight. She even dressed up for the occasion, dumping the sweats and taking a pair of Bailey’s jeans from the pile of clean clothes on the dryer.

She was wearing a lot less gray hair and a dozen fewer pounds. The “divorce diet,” she supposed, recalling a phrase coined by one of her friends.

Outside, warmth bathed her face. She sucked in a deep breath and smelled heated green-the combination of the grass and the hibiscus hedge and the leaves from the jacaranda tree growing in the front corner of the yard. Her mother and father had been late-in-life parents, and she’d lived here since birth. It had always given her a sense of comfort and security, until Dan had left.

Last night she’d decided they were probably done, but maybe she could find peace again. Alone, in the house built by her parents, she could become one of those women who found contentment in work and a safety net in a caring circle of other single females.

Who needed a man? What were they good for?

Still savoring the warm air, she strolled to the mailbox nailed to a post at the bottom of the front walk, noticing someone had decorated it with a lush bow of red ribbon. Tracy ran her forefinger over its velvety surface. Even though the season was always hectic because of the store, she’d still managed little holiday touches like this once she and Dan married and the children were young.

But now with Bailey only an occasional visitor to her life and Harry’s hectic presence off to college, there was no reason to put forth the effort. She wasn’t someone’s mother anymore, she realized with a wrench.

Worse, she wasn’t sure who she was without that.

The metal mailbox was almost hot to touch, so she pried the door open with a fingernail, then pulled out the pile of envelopes stacked inside. She scanned the names on them.

Mr. and Mrs. Daniel Willis.

Mrs. Daniel Willis.

The couple was dissolved. That woman didn’t exist anymore.

A burn rose from her suddenly clenched stomach. Damn Dan! How could he take this away from her! How could he take herself away?

No, no. She slammed the mailbox shut, and the violent clang shut off the anger rising inside her. The new woman she wanted to be wasn’t going to feel like this. The new Tracy would choose her emotions just as she chose her identity.

She was going to be a serene person, she decided. One of those types who floated over the highs and lows of life.

As she turned back to the house, a car coming down the street caught her eye. Her hand tightened on the mail, creasing the cable bill. Serene, she told herself. Tranquil. Peaceful.

It was her footsteps that rushed in a panic up the front walk. Inside, she was a calm sea.

The calm sea didn’t make it through the entry before Dan was out of his car. “Tracy?”

She shut the door when he was on the sidewalk. Locked it as he mounted the porch steps.

Then, her heart clattering in her chest, she slid down against the painted wood, her legs no longer able to hold her steady. She rested her forehead on her upraised knees, fighting for breath.

It was still a struggle when she heard the scratch of a key in the lock. Her head jerked up, and she scrambled to her feet. She just managed to move away before the door hit her in the butt.

Then he was framed in the doorway. Her husband.

Her estranged husband.

“What the hell are you doing?” Her heart jumped again, astonished by the curse-she never cursed-and The Exorcist rasp of her voice.

“I have a key. My name’s on the deed. Why wouldn’t I enter my own home?” His dark hair was longer than she’d ever seen it. It swung over his brow like a boy’s-like Harry’s-and she could see the faint whiteness of the crows’ feet at the corners of his watchful eyes.

He was tan, damn him. No hiding out in dark rooms for the SOB who’d walked out on her.

Anger rose like bile again, but Tracy managed to swallow it down as she turned her back and strode off toward the kitchen. “Get what you came for, and then leave,” she said over her shoulder.

God, she was good. That had sounded somewhat sane. Poised, even. As if she were in control of her emotions and not the other way around.

She could carry off this serenity thing. Be it, even. She could.

Until she felt Dan’s hand on her elbow. “Tracy-”

She whirled with a screech, as if he’d burned her. “Get your hands off me.”

He lifted them, surrender style. “I just want to talk.”

“No.” She backed away.

He stalked forward.

Her heart hammered against her breastbone as she retreated down the hall. “Come back some other time.”

“Now is the time.” His voice was hard, his gaze intent on her face. It had been years since she was aware of how strong he was. Though he wasn’t a particularly tall man, his build was powerful, thanks to solid shoulders, lean hips, sturdy legs. He’d been working out, that was obvious.

Bastard. Probably bench pressing bunnies at that Sodom and Gomorrah he called home.

No, he’d just called here home. Anger shot through her bloodstream like a drug. She started to tremble under its all-consuming influence.

“Tracy.” Her gaze dropped from his face to the sinews in his arm as he held out a hand to her. “Now.”

“No.”

He took a step forward, and she whirled again. Ran.

Get away. Get free. Panting already, she sprinted down the hall, hearing his heavy footsteps behind her.

“Damn it, Tracy!”

No. Damn him. Damn him for making her miserable. Angry. Alone.

Catching the baluster at the bottom of the stairs in her hand, she swung herself around and took off up the steps. Yesterday her knees had been creaking. Today she felt supple, strong. A gazelle. A lioness.

A woman running from heartache and all the other emotions that were trying to catch up with her.

Her pulse was pounding in her ears as she gained the upper hall. Dan was still behind her, determined.

To bow her. Break her. Make her cry.

Never. Never never never.

Her first husband had torn her skin off her bones on his way to shattering her heart. She wouldn’t be so vulnerable again.

The master bedroom doorway was in sight. The double doors locked and there wasn’t a key to open them. Dan was too civilized, surely, to break them down.

Just three…more…steps.

She flew through the doorway even as Dan’s big hand clamped down on her shoulder. With a wrench she yanked away from his touch.

But it was too late to lock him out of the bedroom.

Her gaze trained on his face, she backed off again, putting the king-sized mattress between them while he stood, unmoving, at the entrance to the room.

Her chest heaved, her breath stuttered in and out of her lungs.

The tension in the room stretched like taffy between them, but it was nothing so sweet. Tracy licked her suddenly dry lips.

And Dan’s gaze shifted from her face to focus on her mouth.

Heat skittered up her spine. Tracy’s glance darted to the right, catching a glimpse of herself in the mirror over her dresser.

We need roses in our cheeks and highlights in our hair.

Her face was flushed from her race, and it had disheveled the wispy ends of her new haircut. The way her breasts were moving against the T-shirt she wore-tight, another item borrowed from Bailey-made her look like a woman who was less angry than…wanting.

From somewhere, a thought burst in her brain. She looked like a woman ready for sex.

Her gaze jumped back to Dan. There was a new tightness across his cheekbones, a new kind of watchfulness in his eyes.

A new quality to the tension in the room.

Who needs a man? What are they good for?

All at once, Tracy remembered.

He took a measured step into the room. Another.

She clutched one corner of the four-poster bed, her knuckles going white. “What do you think you’re doing?”

His hands went to the hem of his polo shirt and in one swift movement, he stripped it off.

Definitely working out. His shoulders were smooth, round hills of muscles that led to his tan chest that tapered to the flat skin of his belly. Tracy swallowed as his hands pulled at the buttons on his 501s.

Don’t retreat, she told herself. Don’t give him the satisfaction.

“I don’t know what you think is going to happen here.”

“You know exactly what I think is going to happen.” The dark, hard thread in his voice sent a hot shiver down her back. “Take off your clothes, Tracy.”

In broad daylight? The neighbors, their son-

But he was away at college and she wasn’t a mother first and foremost any longer. She was…

“Take them off, Trace.”

At Dan’s command, a brand-new, sexual flame inside her leaped. The heat running down her spine spread, burning every inch of her skin, making it feel tight and too small for what she was trying to hold inside.

Excitement. Arousal.

He was naked now. This man-this stranger in her bedroom-drew closer, his penis jutting toward her with the same aggressive attitude she could see on his face and hear in his voice. Her knees went rubbery again.

Reaching out, he caught the end of her T-shirt in his fist. Then he yanked her close to his nakedness, his other hand biting into the skin at her waist as he jerked her shirt over her head.

“I want you.”

His eyes widened.

She realized the words were hers.

“Then unhook your bra. I want to see your breasts.”

Her fingers trembled as they found the hooks behind her back. Dan’s gaze didn’t move off her face until her bra dropped to the Oriental carpet with an almost silent plop. Then he palmed her shoulders with his hands, squeezing a moment before slowly moving them down her torso to cover her breasts.

Making a cup of his hands, he plumped them for his inspection.

Between her legs she felt swollen, aching, empty.

His thumbs rasped across her nipples and she gasped. Her eyes closed.

“Look at me,” he ordered, his voice harsh.

Her lashes flew open and instinct made her try to move back. His hands tightened their hold on her breasts.

“You’re not going anywhere. You’re not looking at anything but me. You will see me. Know me.” His nostrils flared. “Fuck me.”

Tracy’s heart slammed against her breastbone. He’d never said that word to her before. Never called what they did together a four-letter word.

It excited her, she realized. Maybe she’d found someone else to be instead of Mother! Someone sexual. Excited. Exciting.

Dan rubbed her nipples again. “Take off your pants.”

He didn’t stop touching her breasts as she obeyed. Once nude, she had a moment of doubt. The divorce diet had turned her bony in some areas and saggy in others.

But he was focused on her mouth again, and he leaned over to kiss her, the first thrust of his tongue as strong and sure as she’d always thought her marriage. He shifted his hands to her hips and drew her flush against his body. His chest hair abraded her nipples, his erection pressed hard against her belly.

He still desired her.

His hands cupped her bottom and the angle of his head changed to take her mouth deeper. Heat flashed over her again and that swollen place between her legs throbbed in time with her pumping heart. Oh God.

Her panting breaths rubbed her nipples against his chest and his smooth penis still kissed her abdomen. But it wasn’t enough.

Not enough closeness.

Not enough sensation.

She pushed closer, and his leg slid between hers. His tongue pushed deep as his knee lifted, pressed steadily against the empty place between her thighs. Groaning, she ground herself against it, without regard for daylight or heartbreak or maturity. Did middle-aged women desire like this?

“Do me,” she whispered against his lips, astonished at the raunchiness of her words. A little pleased. She lifted her mouth. “Do me now.”

His eyes narrowed. “Then get on the bed.”

Out of a thousand years’ habit, she half turned to pull back the covers.

“I didn’t tell you to do anything but get on the bed.”

Tracy froze, then glanced over her shoulder at him. “But…” But this was a stranger in her bedroom and he looked determined to have his way.

She slowly climbed onto the bed, letting him have a full-on view of her butt, even as she thought, Who is this woman? She could see her in the dresser mirror, blond hair wild, color high on her cheeks, mouth and nipples the same red. A sexual being. A start to a new woman.

“Hurry up.” Dan put his big hand on the curve of her waist, flipping her to her back and then coming between her legs. “I want to get inside of you.”

His knees pushed her legs wide. His penis took aim, headed in.

“Wait.” Tracy placed her palm on his chest, keeping him at bay. “Protection.”

The man blinked. “What? Protection?”

“Condoms. I don’t know where you’ve been sleeping.”

His jaw tensed. “Tracy-”

“No condom, no come.” She was pretty pleased with the pithy phrase, even though her blood was screaming to get on with it, for him to get on her.

“Where the hell do you expect me-?”

“My son’s bathroom.” At least he wasn’t carrying them in his pockets. Or at least he pretended he wasn’t. “Right across the hall.”

He didn’t say he knew where Harry’s bathroom was. He didn’t protest about the protection any longer. Instead he vaulted off the bed and then returned in a flash, foil packets spread like a poker hand in his fingers.

“Feeling lucky?” she asked.

“No. But I feel like screwing.” His head lowered. His body lowered. His latex-covered erection felt like heaven against her wetness. “I feel like screwing you.”

They didn’t use each other’s names.

They didn’t say much of anything.

Instead, palm to palm, fingers gripping hard, they tumbled on the bed, trembled in each other’s arms, worked hard for release.

Tracy-still not recognizing herself or her lust-turned her head and bit the pillow to keep from screaming when she came.

Dan bit her shoulder as he finished.

Then they were on their backs, side-by-side, not touching. Separate again.

A familiar position.

When he turned to his side to look at her, she kept her gaze on the ceiling.

“We haven’t-”

“No.” They hadn’t fixed anything.

“I won’t apologize.”

“Don’t.” Amazingly, she’d wanted it as much as he.

He rolled off the bed, then reached for his clothes. She watched the newly firm curve of his butt until it was hidden behind his jeans. He pulled his key ring from his front pocket.

There were keys on it she didn’t recognize.

Just as she didn’t recognize herself.

She hated him all over again.

But she curled into a C to keep the anger inside her and bit back her crone shriek as he let himself out of what had once been their house.

Bailey Sullivan’s Vintage Christmas

Facts & Fun Calendar

December 10

Santa Claus’s history traces back to a fourth-century bishop named St. Nicholas. He was credited with bringing three boys back to life, and thus became the patron saint of children.