Thunderbolt over Texas

Nine

The minute the door swung shut on their Miami hotel suite, Cole pulled Sydney into his arms. Passion burst to life inside her, and she fumbled with the buttons at his collar, loosening his tie while he shucked his jacket.

She moaned her satisfaction, burrowing her face into his neck, inhaling deeply. She didn’t know what it was about his scent, but if they could bottle it, they’d make a fortune. She flicked her tongue out to taste his skin, then she suckled a tender spot near his collarbone.

“You make me crazy,” he rasped, running his hands through her hair.

She started on the buttons of his shirt. “You just make me want you.”

“How is it I do that?”

“Breathing,” she answered.

He returned her kisses, reaching for her blouse, popping the buttons and peeling it off her shoulders. He stood back and gazed once more at her lacy bra. “I like it when you breathe, too.”

She unsnapped the hooks and dropped the wisp of fabric to the floor. His eyes darkened, and her body began to hum in earnest.

“Oh, man.” He slowly pulled her in, pressing them skin to skin, holding her tight and setting off tiny explosions in her brain. His hands worked magic. His kisses grew harder, sweeter, ranging further and further.

She tangled her hands in his hair, loving the touch, loving the texture. “Stop time again,” she begged.

He feathered his fingertips down her spine. “I’ll do my best.” He tasted her earlobe. He kissed her neck. He delved sweetly into her mouth, and she thought she never wanted him to stop.

How had she imagined she could live without this?

They’d wasted six whole days, avoiding each other when they could have been in paradise. It was almost criminal.

He peeled off the rest of their clothes, and his touch grew more intimate. A flush covered her body, and an overhead fan whirred a gentle breeze, cooling the heat, sensitizing her skin.

He scooped her into his arms once again and crossed through the French doors to the king-size bed.

“Tell me when to put you down,” he said.

A shudder ran through her at his selfless memory. “Not yet.”

She loved this. There was something about his strength, his caring, his bold masculinity that sent shivers to her core.

He smiled and kissed her lips. Then he kissed her eyelids and the tip of her nose. “You really like this,” he teased.

“I really like this,” she agreed.

“Gotta figure out what fantasy it is.”

She grinned. “Caveman?”

“Viking.”

Her body convulsed. “That’s it.”

His eyes turned stormy. And he sobered, covering her lips in a long, deep kiss as he gently laid her back on the bed. He brushed her hair from her eyes. “You’re beautiful.”

She felt beautiful. She felt desirable and wonderful.

He kissed his way up her body beginning with her ankle, then the bend of her knee, gently flexing her leg until he had access to her inner thigh. His days growth of beard gently abraded her tender skin, sending shivers of desire to her core. His lips nibbled and his tongue teased higher and higher while she gasped his name.

She tensed when he blew gently on her curls. But then she closed her eyes and bit down on her lip as sensation after sensation throbbed their way along her limbs.

This was Cole. She was safe. He wouldn’t hurt her. He wouldn’t hurt anyone.

Then his hand replaced his mouth, gently stretching and filling her as he moved on to kiss her stomach. Her hips came off the bed, and he murmured words of encouragement against her skin.

She grasped for his hair, her hands restless, needing something to do. He moved again and took one nipple into his mouth. She groaned, burying her fingers in his hair. Her entire body arched involuntarily, striving to get closer to the sensations that were driving her sweetly out of her mind.

She dug her fingernails into his shoulders, raking them down his back as he moved up to kiss her mouth.

She opened wide. Finally, finally. She wrapped her arms around his broad body, holding him tight against her breasts. She kissed his mouth, kissed his cheeks, kissed his eyelids, then buried her face in his neck and inhaled.

He kissed the top of her head, one hand stroking down her glistening body, coming to rest on her bottom. “Slow and you just don’t go together, do they?” he gasped.

“Get over it, cowboy,” she rumbled, reveling in the salty taste of his neck.

She felt his deep chuckle.

“I’ll try,” he promised, easing her thighs apart. “I’ll try really, really hard.”

He eased inside her inch by careful inch. She bit down hard on her bottom lip. Time was stopping again.

He did slow it down. Then he sped it up. Then slowed it down again, holding her shimmering until she was sure she’d cry out in desperation. He whispered her name over and over, until the city lights blurred and streamed together, melting into the hot, humid ground.

Hours later, the rising sun turned the edge of the ocean a pearly pink. The champagne bottle was three quarters empty. And the lazy ceiling fan pushed a breeze down on Cole’s bare skin.

He dipped a fresh strawberry into the bowl of whipped cream on the bedside table and held it to Sydney’s lips.

She bit down, smiling her appreciation of the delicacy.

He popped the other half into his own mouth, thinking he could happily stay here for the rest of his life.

“So,” she continued around the berry. “Your great-great-granddaddy, the infamous and sexy Jarred Erickson-”

“I believe I take after him,” said Cole, pushing himself into a sitting position, striking a pose among half a dozen plump, white pillows and a billowing comforter.

“The sexy part or the infamous part?” she asked, bending her knees to cross her ankles in the air and resting her chin on her interlaced fingers.

Cole took in her tousled hair and her bare buttocks. Yep. Definitely forever. “I’m thinking both,” he said.

She grinned and reached for her champagne flute. “So you’re telling me Jarred decreed that the ranch should stay as one parcel into perpetuity?”

Cole nodded. “My ancestors were big on decrees. Every few generations, somebody comes up with something that wreaks havoc for a couple hundred years.”

He figured most of them were lunatics, particularly those who had taken to piracy.

She took a sip of the champagne, and he had to curb an urge to kiss the sweetness from her mouth.

“And your solution is to come up with some new decrees?” she asked.

“Damn straight. It’s my turn. I complied with theirs-”

Sydney coughed out a laugh.

“What?”

“You complied with what, exactly?”

“Passing on the Thunderbolt.”

“Ha. You had to be railroaded into marriage.”

That was unfair. He frowned at her. “It’s completely voluntary.”

“As a last resort.”

He reached for his own champagne, leaning back against the birch headboard. “Point is, it’ll get the job done.”

“You’re also splitting the ranch in half, in defiance of Great-great-granddaddy Jarred.”

“That’s just common sense. Keeping it intact was a stupid idea.”

“Are you always this determined that you’re right and everyone else is wrong?”

“Of course.”

“Of course,” she mimicked.

“Hey, if a man doesn’t trust his own judgment, what’s left?”

She laughed again, nearly spilling her champagne. Then she twisted into a sitting position, rearranging the comforter over her lap. “You know, whoever came up with the wenches and ale rule, sure had you Erickson men pegged.”

“Wenches and ale?”

“Yeah. You know. The wenches and ale.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Didn’t your grandma tell you?”

Cole shook his head.

Sydney leaned across him, snagging another strawberry and dipping it in the cream. “That’s why the women get the brooch.” She popped the berry into her mouth. “Somebody back in the fourteenth century decided you guys might sell it for wenches and ale. You know, the Erickson of the day would change the tradition. And, poof, there would go the Thunderbolt.”

Cole couldn’t help but grin.

“What?” she asked.

“Who needs wenches and ale?” He lifted his flute in a mock toast. “I’ve got champagne and-”

“Watch it, cowboy.”

He leaned forward and kissed her strawberry lips, taking the safe route. “A princess.”

She pulled back. “A princess?”

Okay, too sappy. “A hot babe?”

She raised her eyebrows.

He decided to go with the truth. “A beautiful, intelligent, funny, gracious lady?”

“That’s not bad.”

He took the champagne from her hand and set both glasses down on the bedside table. “Come here,” he said, needing to feel her all over again. He gathered her into his arms and they stretched out on the comforter.

She sighed and rested her head on his shoulder.

He stroked her hair, releasing its scent. “Wenches and ale. How is it you know more about my family than I do?”

“I’m nosey. I ask lots of questions.”

He settled his arm more comfortably around her. Traffic sounds came to life on the street below, and the rising sun flashed its orange rays through the balcony doors.

“Let me ask you a question,” he said, twirling a lock of her hair around his index finger.

“Fire away.”

“You said you had foster parents.”

She nodded. “I lost my parents in a house fire when I was five.”

Cole tightened his arm around her, and the ceiling fan whooshed into the silence.

“My foster parents were friends of the family. Nanny Emma and Papa Hal raised me. But they were older. And they’ve both since passed away.”

Cole’s heart went out to her. He didn’t know what he’d do without his family. “You must miss them all.”

“Nanny and Papa, yes. But I don’t really remember my parents at all. I have these vague images of them in my mind.”

“What about pictures?”

“Burned in the fire. A few of the neighbors had shots of my father from a distance, but they tell me my mother was always behind the camera, not in front of it.”

Cole’s chest tightened at the injustice. Never to know what your mother looked like? At twenty, he’d ached for his mother. Sydney had been five.

Protective instincts welled up inside him. “What about newspapers? Her high school yearbook? Surely somebody-”

“It’s okay.” Sydney reached over and stroked her palm across his beard-stubbled cheek, comforting him, when he should have done it for her.

“What do you remember?” he asked, covering her small hand with his own.

“My mother’s locket.” Sydney relaxed against him again, smiling at what was obviously a touchstone memory. “It was silver, oval-shaped. It had a flower, I think it was a rose, etched into the front. I don’t know whose picture was inside, but it would dangle down when she bent over to hug me. I distinctly remember reaching for it. Her hair was blond, and it sort of haloed around the locket.”

“Where’s the locket now?”

“Destroyed by the fire.”

“Oh, Sydney.”

“It’s really okay.”

He tucked her hair behind one ear and gently kissed the top of her head. “I guess that explains a lot.”

She tipped her chin to look up at him, green eyes narrowing. “Explains what?”

“Your profession. Your burning desire to locate antiquities.”

She pulled back. “I locate antiquities because I have a master’s degree in art history.”

“You have a master’s degree because you’ve spent your life looking for the locket.”

“That’s silly. The locket was destroyed more than twenty years ago.”

He touched her temple with his index finger. “Maybe in here.” He placed his hand over her heart. “But not in here.”

“Did you minor in psychology?”

“Computer science. With a major in agriscience.”

“Then you’re completely unqualified to analyze me.”

“I supposed you’re right,” he said to appease her. But qualified or not, he knew hers was a personal search.

She stifled a yawn.

“We need to sleep,” he said.

“It’s morning already.”

“Not quite.”

He sidled down the bed, keeping her wrapped in his arms.

“We do need to sleep,” she agreed. Then she smiled as she closed her eyes.

Cole sucked in a deep breath. Sleeping with Sydney in his arms. He could get used to this. He shouldn’t. She had her career and he had his family.

Still, he could get used to this.

Eyes closed, Sydney waited until Cole’s breathing was deep and even. Then she blinked away her fatigue and watched his profile in the gathering light. His tanned skin was stark against the white pillowcase, and she gave into an urge to run her fingertip along his rough chin. She wished she could be honest with him, take him with her, listen to his advice.

For a moment she considered waking him up and swearing him to secrecy. Then she could tell him all about his grandmother’s problem, and they could solve it together.

But she couldn’t do that. She wasn’t even sure Cole would want her to do that. She had a feeling he’d consider a promise to any member of his family to be a sacred trust.

When she was sure he was sound asleep, she carefully inched out of the cradle of his hug and slipped from beneath the covers.

It was 8:00 a.m. in Miami, five in California and seven in Texas. She could only hope that Cole’s late night and all those time zone changes would keep him unconscious a few more hours.

She tiptoed into the living room, carefully clicked the French door shut behind her and turned on a small lamp on the desktop. Then she opened her purse and retrieved the number for the Miami fashion show. Hopefully, they’d have contact information for Rupert Cowan.

She dialed the number, spoke to a show coordinator who had Rupert Cowan’s business phone number and address. She jotted it down on the hotel notepad, peeled off the sheet and tucked the slip of paper into her purse.

She had no way of knowing if he was the right Rupert Cowan. Heading down there might be a waste of time. But she couldn’t for the life of her come up with a way to broach the subject with him on the phone.

She had no choice but to approach him in person and keep her fingers crossed.

She might have one heck of a lot of explaining to do once she got back. But it was time to pull out all the stops. If Rupert Cowan did have the brooch, and if she could get her hands on it, Cole would probably be grateful enough not to question the details.

She unzipped her garment bag, retrieved a blazer and skirt that were only slightly wrinkled, then dressed and headed for the lobby.

When Cole woke up, Sydney was nowhere to be found. She wasn’t in the suite. She wasn’t in the hotel restaurant. And she wasn’t in the lobby.

He knew he had to stop being suspicious of her, but it was unnerving to have her just up and disappear. They were supposed to be working together. Even though he’d promised to give her the benefit of the doubt, he couldn’t help but wonder if she was up to something.

Okay, so there was every chance that she was investigating antique dealers, or maybe she’d just gone around the corner. She could easily show up any minute with coffee and bagels.

Still, he glanced around the suite, taking inventory. Her suitcase was open on the sofa. Her toiletries were in the main bathroom. She’d opened a bottle of water at the bar.

What else?

He glanced around for clues.

A pen lay haphazardly across the oak desk next to a hotel note pad. Nothing to say the housekeeping staff hadn’t set them out crooked, but nothing to say Sydney hadn’t used them, either.

Cole held the notepad up to the light, staring across the fibrous surface. There were a few indentations in the paper, so he took a trick from a television crime drama and shaded across them with a pencil.

Rupert Cowan-2713 Harper View Road. Didn’t sound like a deli or a coffee shop to Cole.

Didn’t sound like anything, he told himself. She could have a perfectly legitimate reason for writing that down and leaving.

After last night, he was giving her the benefit of the doubt if it killed him.

He crumpled the shaded paper in his fist.

It might even be left over from the last guest.

They’d probably laugh about it later.

He tossed the note into the wastepaper basket and sat down on the couch, bracing his fists on his knees.

He couldn’t wait to laugh about it later.