TWICE VICTORIOUS Read online

  Why? He knew why. The reason was standing here in the circle of his arms.

  She kept forgetting how big he was. She was not a small woman, but Adam Vanderhook would have absolutely no trouble picking her up and carting her off to the shower.

  She didn't really believe he would, but he could. And that might be the nicest thing to happen to her this month.

  She felt the springiness of his chest hair beneath his shirt, saw it framed by his open collar. More than once her fingers had itched to comb again through the whorls on his pectorals, to trace a bold journey across his hard belly. Time after time she imagined him naked, wondered if he was the same rich golden tan all over.

  She was doing it again! Forgetting that she had a purpose in life and that Adam was a temptation that could prevent her ever reaching her goal.

  On the other hand, she hadn't been out of the house all week, except to P.T. and the store. Chamber music did sound better than another sappy video, another evening of popcorn and pathos. She didn't have to give in to her treacherous emotions. A nice quiet evening together, that's all she wanted from Adam.

  "What time should I be ready?" Her tone was just a little belligerent, even to her ears, as if she was trying to convince herself as much as him. She cleared her throat. "I really should clean up this mess before I go anywhere."

  "Leave it," he said. "If we want to have supper before the concert, you'll need to hurry. I'll take care of all this." He started gathering up the debris of the past several days, while she wavered.

  But for the first time in days she wanted real food. Healthy stick-to-her-ribs food, instead of sugar and salt and fat. "I'll be ready in half an hour," she promised.

  She didn't quite sing in the shower, but she was conscious of the world seeming brighter than it had all week.

  * * * *

  He was definitely not making progress. Stell had chattered brightly during dinner, quickly changing the subject each time he brought up her injuries. During the concert, she'd seemed to be somewhere else entirely. Now she was sitting on her side of the car, silently staring out the window into the night, completely turned inward. "You've been quiet all evening. Want to tell me why?" He knew what was bothering her, but she needed to talk about it, to share her feelings. It was the only way she could get past the denial.

  Besides, he didn't want to take her home, didn't want the evening to end so soon. Instead of turning east on Burnside, he kept going north. There was a full moon and he had the urge to drive up to Crown Point.

  "No, I don't think so." Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her lean back against the headrest. "It's not something I want to dwell on." Her voice lacked its usual briskness, was flat and without color.

  "Okay, but if you change your mind, I'm a great listener." He maneuvered the car onto the freeway.

  The acceleration penetrated her withdrawal. "Where are we going? This isn't the way to my house."

  "I thought we'd take a little ride. It's not late, and it's a beautiful night. Look at the moon."

  Rising into a cloudless sky just north of Mt. Hood's still snow-covered peak, the full moon cast its pale light over the mountains to the east. Once they were free of the city's lights, they would be in another world: empty, silent, tranquil.

  "I should get home." But her tone was hesitant, lacking determination.

  "Later." This time, when he reached for her hand, she let him take it. She didn't return his squeeze, though, and her fingers lay passive within his grasp. He moved his thumb across her knuckles, wishing to be somewhere else, somewhere quiet and peaceful, conducive to conversation, to shared feelings, to revealed thoughts. He knew what was sapping her energy, stealing her usual vitality. With his help she could learn to live with disaster.

  "Maybe you're right." The words dropped into the dark silence and just sat there.

  "About what?"

  She was silent a long time, long enough for him to leave the freeway and climb the twisting road up to the top of the cliffs above the river.

  "About my racing," she finally said. "My obsession, as you insist on calling it."

  It was his turn to be silent. He really believed that her determination to ride in the Sawtooth Classic bordered on obsessive, but at the same time, it bothered him to hear her admit it.

  The dark, winding road took all of his attention. Finally he pulled into the parking area at the Vista House. "Shall we walk? It's not far."

  "I'm not crippled!"

  He didn't respond, hearing the pain in her voice. A few minutes later they were at the upper level railing, looking over an ethereal scene. The river glinted at the bottom of the sheer cliffs, hundreds of feet below. They might have been alone in the world, except that a few cars on the freeway sent arrows of light into the night. A tugboat on the Columbia cut a faint wake in the black water as it chugged upriver, pushing long barges filled with imported products for inland markets.

  Adam slipped his arm around her and pulled her close. "You've changed your tune," he said.

  "It may have been changed for me." Her voice trembled. "I...I...oh, Adam, what if I can't ever ride again?" She turned in his embrace, leaning against his chest, shaking him with the force of her sobs.

  "Hush," he soothed. "Hush. You'll be all right. Just be patient and keep working on your exercises. Don't give up trying, don't give up hope." What was he saying? If she had to give up cycling, she would have time for a life again. She would have time for love.

  She would have time for him.

  He was warm. He was comforting. He was gentle. Stell clung to him, feeling as if he was the only stable point in her confusing, callous universe. She welcomed the security of his embrace, wanting this one moment in time where she could feel protected, cherished. Where she could lean on someone else for a change.

  Adam's breath warmed her ear. The vibration of his heart soothed, calmed, until her sobs ceased to choke her, her tears dried. His arms, holding her tightly, were a shield between her and a world she couldn't quite face.

  "Hush," he said again. "It isn't the end of the world. You'll do whatever you make up your mind to do, Stell. You won't give up."

  "What if I do? What if...?"

  He tilted her chin up so she looked into his eyes, pale in the moonlight. "Listen to me. If you want to ride again--really want to--you will. I can't believe you'd ever let anyone or anything stop you from doing what you decided to do."

  "I'm glad someone believes in me." She buried her nose in the soft wool of his sports jacket, savoring the woodsy-spicy scent of him. "I was beginning to wonder if I shouldn't sell my bikes." That and other, more drastic, courses of action had occurred to her this week, between old movies and trips to the refrigerator.

  "Maybe it is time for you to do some pretty hard thinking about your priorities," he told her. "I hate to see you clinging to a lost cause." His voice was sympathetic, full of unmistakable concern for her.

  "That might be just what I am doing," she admitted. Just saying the words triggered a terrible sense of loss. "After all, there's no guarantee I'll be ever be able to ride competitively again."

  "It won't be so bad." His breath disturbed the hair above her ear, sent tingles along her shoulder. "You're depressed now because your leg isn't healing the way you think it should." He turned her around as if she were nothing more than a toy in his hands. "Whatever happens, Stell, it's time for you to open your eyes and see that there's a great big world waiting for you. One that has nothing to do with cycling." He tightened his arms around her waist, pulling her back against his body. "Look out there! How can you worry about something you can't do anything about when you've got all that before you?"

  She looked and had to agree. The Columbia Gorge stretched below her and to the east, breathtaking in its immensity. She had ridden up to Crown Point many times, both alone and in group rides. But she had never stopped to enjoy the view, never come out here onto the overlook path below Vista House, not since she was a child on a Sunday outing with her parents. "
Oh my!" she breathed. "It is something, isn't it?" This was the first time she'd been here at night.

  Again Adam chuckled. "You sound surprised. How can you live in Portland and not be aware of this view?"

  "It's easy," she admitted, not particularly proudly. "All you have to do is live your life so that scenery is low on the list." Taking a deep breath, she leaned back into his embrace. "What do they say about taking time to smell the flowers? Maybe that's what I've been forgetting to do."

  "That's what I've been trying to tell you," he said, dropping light, butterfly kisses across her nape. His hand crept under her light jacket, stroked across her midriff, skimming the bottoms of her breasts so lightly she almost wondered if she wasn't imagining his touch.

  It would be easy, she thought, to relax. All she had to do was give up, to stop striving toward a goal that might have become unobtainable, no matter how hard she was willing to work.

  Perhaps she could make time in her life for romance. For Adam. She wouldn't have to feel guilty for stealing moments with him, away from her training.

  His hands grew bolder, distracting her completely from thoughts of the future. As her nipple tightened under his fingers, she felt a surge of warmth in her midriff, a wave of desire so immense, so unstoppable, that she almost fainted with the sensation. She arched her back, pressing her hips into his, feeling the swelling that told her his need was as great as hers. As his hands boldly cupped her breasts, she drew a deep breath, knowing that tonight she wasn't going to make any decision. Tonight she was going to take time out from reality to follow her heart, not her head.

  Chapter Seven

  BREAKAWAY: a group of riders in front of the peloton

  Adam wondered if he was setting himself up for rejection again. Then he decided he didn't care. Stell was a warm, pliant armful, willing, responsive, and as hot with desire as he was. He ground his hips against the firm curves of her buttocks, intensifying the ache in his loins, the need to bury himself deep, deep within her warmth.

  He turned her in his arms, finding her mouth with his, plunging his tongue into her hot sweetness. She met him with equal ardor, sucking, pulling him deeper. She moaned, urgent sounds, pleading sounds. "Now," they told him. "Right here. Right now."

  Oh, yes!

  Her hands were inside his jacket, inside his shirt. Her busy fingers were unbuttoning, tearing his shirt free of his trousers. She backed him against the stone railing, her kisses randomly tasting his cheek, his mouth, his chin. She nipped, licked, nuzzled, burrowing her face into the space where his shirt and tie had been miraculously loosened. All the while her supple body was pressing, rubbing against him, arousing him to unthinking heights of need.

  He pulled his mouth away from her delectable neck, gasped into her ear. "Wait...car... Not here." Tugging against her insistent hands, he managed to pull her in the direction of his car, hating the bucket seats, the four-on-the-floor transmission that made it impractical for them to consummate their passion here and now.

  Stell swayed against the fender, pulled Adam against herself. "Lift me," she said into his open mouth.

  "Hmmm?" He'd discovered her chin, her throat, skin so soft, so satiny that he wanted to go on kissing it forever.

  Her hands were strong on his shoulders. "Lift me, Adam. I can't jump."

  He saw what she wanted. His hands were steady on her slim waist as he lifted her the few inches necessary to seat her on the front fender. She parted her legs and pulled him between them.

  He drew her tight against him. Even through his slacks, he could feel the furnace heat of her feminine center. He stroked shaking hands down the outsides of her nylon-clad thighs, across her knees, and up, feeling the strength of her athlete's legs.

  She pushed his hands aside as she reached for his zipper. "Let me," she said, her voice hoarse with wanting. Releasing him from the tight confines of his trousers, she cradled him gently in her hands. touching him delicately with busy thumbs, driving him into a frenzy of need.

  His hands found the waistband of her pantyhose, tugged.

  "Wait, Adam," she whispered, "not here. It's too public."

  Reminded that they were on an open, windswept bluff, Adam forced his hands to cease their impatient seeking. He looked around.

  Theirs was the only car in the parking lot. The way the road wound along the cliff tops, they would see any oncoming car for miles. "It's all right," he said, nipping the scented flesh under her ear. He tugged again at her panty hose, determined to remove that last fragile barrier.

  "Wait," she insisted, her touch less delicate, more purposeful. "Let me, please." She stroked the aching length of him.

  Her mouth was busy too. Between the wet, demanding kisses she was planting across his face and down his throat and the insistence of her stroking, he was helpless, held in chains of passion stronger than gravity, more irresistible than the tides.

  Caught up in forces beyond his control, he lost all awareness of the world around him, forgot that they were standing on a windy point under a bright moon. His consciousness shrunk to the sensations she engendered within him, the unstoppable compulsion toward fulfillment. He forgot that it was only her hands, not her warm, moist body into which he was thrusting.

  The pressure grew, became overpowering. His body convulsed. The world disappeared, while he hung suspended out of time and space.

  She still cradled him, gently now, as he slumped against her, only his hands braced on the fender keeping him from puddling on the pavement.

  "Adam."

  Her whisper reminded him where they were, fully visible to any passing car. He fumbled in his pocket, handed her his handkerchief. "I'm sorry," he said, ashamed of his lack of control, mortified at his lack of good sense, his selfish pleasure.

  "Don't be. I wanted to." She cupped his face between her hands, forced him to look at her. "I really did. Besides..."

  He stopped her next words with firm pressure of his forefinger against her lips. "Don't tell me you owed me, please."

  "I wasn't going to. I was going to point out that unzipped trousers are a lot less obvious than a skirt hiked up around my neck." She giggled, a sound he'd never heard from her. "Not to mention my pantyhose draped on the car antenna."

  He had to laugh. "Hey, credit me with more cool than that. I'd have tucked them under the wipers."

  "To blow in the wind, right?" She slid down, using his body to slow her fall. His arms went around her as she leaned against him. "Can we go home now?" he whispered into her ear, nipping the lobe and tasting again her sweetness. Once they were alone, he would make delicious love to her, would bring her to completion, would share paradise with her.

  "Oh, yes, please. Let's go home." Her smile was a promise.

  They were almost into town when a soft warble filled the expectant silence of the car. "Damn!" He reached for his jacket pocket. Why hadn't he left the cell phone at home tonight? Adam pulled to the side of the road.

  A few minutes later his hopes for the rest of the night were forgotten. For a moment he slumped back against the seat, knowing it was going to be a long night.

  "What is it, Adam? What happened?"

  For a moment he felt as if the weight of the world rested on his shoulders. "My mother," he said. "She's in the hospital. I've got to go."

  "Of course you do. Look, there's a truck stop just ahead. You can drop me there. I'll call a cab."

  "No. No, I'll take you home." He reached across and touched her thigh. "I'm sorry, Stell. This wasn't how I planned the evening to end."

  She patted his hand. "No, it's not. But maybe it's for the best, Adam. I'm not sure we're ready for the next step."

  To him, the next step seemed inevitable, even though in his saner moments he wasn't sure taking it would be wise. Damn! What am I doing? Mom may be seriously ill, and all I can think about is sex. He forced himself to concentrate on his driving.

  He walked Stell to her door, noticing how she tried not to limp. At the door, he held her for a moment, simply en
joying the sensual pleasure of this warm, pliant woman in his arms. "I'll call you first chance I have," he said, releasing her.

  "I'll be waiting."

  * * * *

  For the thirtieth time Tuesday morning, Stell reached for the telephone. She was finding it impossible to concentrate on her work. All she could think of was Adam, worrying that he might be facing a major family crisis alone. She knew how frightening that could be. Warren, her only close relative, had been in the Navy during her father's last illness.

  "Stop fretting," she told herself. "He's got a sister and brother-in-law, at least." But she couldn't just erase her worry, or her growing anger at his not calling, to let her know how his mother was, if for no other reason.

  She dialed. To her surprise, the receptionist said Adam was on another line. Would she care to hold?

  She would. She had a lot to say to him.

  As she twisted the telephone cord around her finger, Stell tried to sort out her contradictory feelings. On the one hand, she was relieved that he was in his office. That meant his mother must be holding her own, at least.

  But on the other hand, she was mildly angry, too. He should have known she was concerned. Why hadn't he let her know his mother's condition? He'd said he'd call, hadn't he? For all she knew, he might have walked off the edge of the world.

  "Ms. McCray? Mr. Vanderhook will call you back. He's going to be tied up for some time." The receptionist sounded harried.

  "Of course. I just called to see how is mother is, anyway."

  "Oh, I can tell you that. Mrs. Vanderhook is resting comfortably and will be having surgery tomorrow morning."

  "What...?"

  "I'm sorry, Ms. McCray. I have several incoming calls. Mr. Vanderhook will get back to you." The line went dead.

  Stell glared at the phone. His mother must be more than mildly ill if she was going in for surgery so soon. "Well, there's nothing I can do," she said to herself. "And I've certainly got enough to keep me busy."

  Her sloppy self-indulgence had put her behind. Usually three or four hours a day kept her current. She hadn't even turned on the computer last week. She hadn't done much of anything after seeing Carl last Monday.