Lacy. Diana Palmer

hers mercilessly.

      There was little use in denying it. He saw too deeply. “I suppose you have to go?” she asked miserably.

      “This is my country, Lacy,” he said simply. “It would be the essence of cowardice to refuse to fight for it.” His strong, brown hands held her upper arms firmly. “Haven’t you heard anything I’ve said about air power, about the edge it would give us on the Hun if we could assist the French Lafayette Escadrille in developing it?”

      “Why the French?” she asked absently. The scent of him, the closeness of him, made her dizzy with pleasure. She only wanted to prolong it.

      “Because the American air corps has no planes of its own,” he said simply. “We’ll be flying Nieuports and Sopwiths.”

      “Flying is dangerous…” she began.

      “Life is dangerous, Lacy,” he replied quietly. He looked at her soft mouth with its dark lip rouge. Absently he reached up and smudged it with his thumb, smiling as the bloodred color transferred itself from her lower lip to his skin. “Like being branded,” he teased. “I could use this war paint on my cattle.”

      “It washes off,” Lacy pointed out.

      “Does it?” He reached in his pocket for his handkerchief and, holding her firmly by the nape of her neck with his free hand, proceeded to wipe off every trace of it.

      “Cole, don’t!” she protested, trying to turn her head.

      “I’m not wearing that stain to the train station,” he replied, his mind on what he was doing, not what he was saying.

      But Lacy went quite still, her wide eyes unblinking on his hard, dark face. “W—what?”

      He smiled with faint indulgence as he finished his task and tossed the handkerchief into his dresser. “You heard me.” His gaze went over her soft oval face, from her short dark hair to her big blue eyes and down her straight little nose to the bow mouth he’d wiped clean. “This might have been unthinkable before. But I don’t know when I’ll come back again. Isn’t it permissible for a patriotic lad to be sent off with a kiss?”

      Her fingers plucked nervously at the buttons of his shirt, tingling as they felt the warmth of his bare torso under them. “Of course,” she said, almost strangling.

      His lean hands framed her face with an odd hesitancy and he moved closer, towering over her.

      She could barely breathe. She’d dreamed of this moment for years, lived for it, hoped for it. Now it was happening, and she was self-conscious and shy and scared to death that she wouldn’t live up to his expectations.

      “I…know nothing of kissing,” she confessed quickly.

      She felt more than heard his breath catch, but the only sign he gave of having heard her was the jerky pressure of his hands increasing as he bent toward her.

      “Practice makes perfect, don’t they say, Lacy?” he asked in an oddly husky tone, and his rough, coffee-scented mouth ground into hers without preamble or apology.

      She gave in without a protest, yielding to his superior strength, to his growing hunger. She knew nothing, but he taught her, his mouth invading hers in the silence of the big, high-ceilinged room, his arms slowly enveloping her against the taut fitness of his tall body.

      He lifted his head just briefly, to draw breath, and his dark, eyes met hers. She was dazed, weak, clinging to him while her parted, swollen lips invited again the madness he was teaching her.

      “Don’t stop,” she whispered shamelessly.

      “I’m not sure I could, in any case,” he whispered back. His head lowered again and this time his mouth was gentle, teasing, exploring hers with tenderness and lazy hunger that grew to anguished passion in no time at all.

      She felt the wall at her back, cold and hard, and Cole’s heated body pressing her into it, in an intimacy that she’d never even dreamed. The contours of his flat stomach had changed quite suddenly; his mouth was hurting hers.

      Frightened, her hands pressed frantically against the hair-roughened strength of his chest.

      Cole drew back at once, his own eyes as shocked as hers at the barriers of decency he’d overstepped in his mindless desire. He stepped away from her, dark color overlaying his high cheekbones.

      Lacy’s swollen lips were parted as she struggled for breath and composure, staring up at him with embarrassed comprehension. He shuddered just slightly, and, Lacy’s eyes encountered with sudden and startled starkness the visible evidence of his loss of control. She blushed red and averted her eyes even as Cole turned away from her.

      She didn’t know what to say, what to do. Her body felt oddly swollen and hot, and there was a tightness in her lower stomach that she’d never experienced. Her bodice felt far too tight. She tugged at the lace of her white midi blouse and searched for the right words.

      “I beg your pardon, Lacy,” Cole said in a taut, all-too-formal tone, although he didn’t look at her. “I never meant that to happen.”

      “It’s all right,” she replied huskily. “I—I should have protested.”

      “You did. Too late,” he added, with faint dryness, as he turned toward her, back in command of his senses once more. His dark hair was disheveled, lying over his broad forehead, and there was still that faint color on his high cheekbones. His deep brown eyes held a light that was puzzling as they swept with new boldness over Lacy’s slender body and back up to her own vivid blue eyes.

      “I—I should go,” she faltered.

      “Yes, you should,” he agreed. “You’ll be compromised if any of the family find us alone like this in my bedroom.”

      But she didn’t move. Neither did he.

      His chest rose and fell deeply. “Come here,” he said softly, and opened his arms.

      She went into them gracefully, and laid her hot cheek against his cool, damp chest, the thick hair tickling her skin. His heartbeat was deep and quick, like his breathing, but he held her with utter decorum, his arms protective rather than passionate.

      “Wait for me,” he whispered into her ear.

      “All my life,” she replied brokenly.

      His arms contracted then, and he shivered with feeling. But after a few seconds, he put her away from him, searching her eyes with banked-down hunger.

      “I love you,” she said unsteadily, damning pride and self-respect.

      “Yes,” he said, his voice deep and quiet, his face giving nothing away. “Try to help Mother with Katy and Ben while I’m away. Stay close to the house. Don’t go out alone, ever.”

      “I won’t.”

      He drew in a slow breath. “The war won’t last forever. And I’m not suicidal. No more tears.”

      She managed a shaky smile. “Not until you leave, at least,” she promised.

      His fingers traced her cheek tenderly. “I thought you were afraid of me, all these years. But it wasn’t fear, was it?” he asked, his jaw tightening as he looked at her. “You’ve loved me for a long time, and I never saw it.”

      She nodded slowly. “I never meant you to know.”

      “It’s just as well that I do, now,” he replied. He bent and brushed a slow, tender kiss over her lips. “Write to me,” he whispered. “I’ll come home, Lacy.”

      “I’ll pray every night for you,” she replied. “Oh, Cole….”

      “No more tears,” he said sternly when her eyes began to sparkle with them. “I can’t bear to see you cry.”

      “Sorry.” She drew back from him, her heart in her face. “I’d better go, hadn’t I?”

      “I’m