He listened to the whir of the vaporizer, Magda's slight but steady snore, Lori's even breathing as she slept beside him.
Gray turned to look at her, the edge of the mattress rubbing along his neck. Lori slumped asleep, propped in the corner created by the end table and mattress. Her arm draped up to the bed, her hand on Magda's arm.
Unable to stop himself, he reached to rest his hand on top of Lori's. She didn't wake, but still laced her fingers with his. He held on to her soft hand and stared out the door again.
He hadn't meant to tell her so much. There was so much more he could have said. Not that it made any difference except to leave him feeling as if he'd taken a load of shrapnel internally.
Lori had just listened and held his hand, like now. She gave to others even in her sleep. Just like his mother.
And he'd pushed her away. Just like his father.
Gray freed his hand if not his thoughts.
God, he was tired. He'd monitored patients through the night before. What was it about this particular mother and daughter that drained his reserves more than a wardful of patients? She'd bombarded his defenses until he'd stupidly indulged in morose psychobabble garbage.
Time to shake it off pal. If he was that tired, then Lori must be past exhaustion. She needed to be in her own bed.
Gray stood and checked Magda, careful not to wake her, then scooped Lori into his arms. Just like a few days before, a year ago, she snuggled in for a secure fit. Thank heaven she slept on though. He wasn't up to resisting any more of her groggy gropings.
Limp with deep sleep, Lori didn't stir during his walk down the hall to her bedroom. He lowered her to her bed and tucked her under the covers with lingering hands.
Lori's towering four-poster canopy bed enticed him to stay. The door finished its swing in, the lean of the house and gravity at work until the door clicked shut as if defying him to leave. A bottle of peach lotion waited on the bedside table like an invitation to remember things he could never forget, anyway.
Lori's hand trailed down his arm and held fast to his hand. "Stay. Sleep."
Did she know what she was offering? Or was she talking in her sleep again, trapped in the familiarity of a year ago?
Gray found her eyes open, fairly clear. Her touch was steady and warm. "Stay."
He thought of mentioning Magda as an excuse, but beside Lori's bed the nursery monitor glowed with a single red light. Magda's gentle snuffling floated through the device. He would hear her if she called out from down the hall.
Too tired to argue or pull his hand free, Gray lay beside Lori. On top of the fluffy comforter. No use tempting fate. He would just grab a little shut-eye in case Lori or Magda needed him, easier than making the cross-town drive again.
Taking care of Magda, then falling victim to Lori's gentle prodding left him more wiped out than he'd been after a Desert Storm mission. Gray closed his eyes and hoped like hell combat-induced dreams wouldn't chase him into sleep.
Chapter 10
Lori settled deeper into the most incredible dream. And it involved plastering herself against Gray's warm, solid body.
Surrendering to the dream proved irresistible. She'd been so long without. Without him.
Her hungry hands climbed over his back, along the rippling cut of muscles and pure man. Her fingers itched with impatience to feel him, not the well-worn T-shirt. A frantic trek to his waist brought her to the hem of his shirt. She tunneled inside.
Skin to skin she touched him. Her face buried in his neck, she inhaled, snuggled closer, pressed her lips to the delicious salty taste of his shoulder. She kicked her down-filled comforter to the foot of the bed so she could cuddle closer.
Gray groaned. Somewhere in her hazy mind she heard him, felt him turn his face to her.
"Lori?"
Instinct guided her mouth to his before he could say more.
Searing, hot need painted vibrant reds and blues on the backs of her eyelids. Heat combusted within her, sleep evaporating. Her hands paused, tensed. What was she doing? Other than almost passing out with pleasure just because she had Gray's mouth against her, fully, finally.
She thought of pulling away. For all of one practical second.
Lori twisted her fingers in his hair and yanked Gray closer. Hard. No doubt, remnants of sleep clouded her judgment. She didn't care. How could she think, much less reason while her legs tangled themselves with Gray's?
She worked her lips over his in a silent, demanding plea he couldn't miss, hopefully couldn't resist. Opening, urging, she traced her tongue along his mouth, then nipped at his bottom lip. Again, harder.
His lips parted with a hungry growl. Bold, strong hands clamped along her back, one on her waist, the other between her shoulder blades, both firm and insistent.
Forget about deluding herself into thinking that sleep muddled her reactions. She knew exactly what she was doing and simply couldn't stop.
The past year slid away as their tongues tangled, tasted, tempted. Her hands remembered he liked the brush of her thumbs just below his jaw, along his collarbone, over his small, flat nipples. Gray traced a tantalizing touch down her spine, one vertebra at a time until she was ready to scream with the need for more, had done so often before. He had to remember, too, and that stirred her to a near frenzy as she thought of what would come next.
If only they didn't stop.
Gray rolled her to her back, anchoring her to the mattress and the moment as she stared up into his glittering eyes. Her shirt scrunched up. His followed. Gray's bristly chest rasped her br**sts to agonizing tightness. Her fingers crawled down his back, found their way into his shorts and gripped his taut buttocks.
His shorts inched low on his hips, hers following as Lori rocked against Gray. With frightening ease, they recaptured their familiar rhythm. Together, but frustratingly incomplete as two layers of cotton separated them.
He was such a great kisser, and Lori loved to kiss. Loved to kiss him, loved to look at him. Her leg hooked around Gray's hip, and he grabbed the back of her knee. Their boxers inched lower, his as well as hers, with Lori's every restless, needy wriggle. The hard, hot length of him pressed to her, so close, so intimate. No longer feeling cotton, just Gray, she savored that moment of delicious realization just before…
He slid in.
Full, thick pressure filled her, stretched her. The pleasure of it, after so long without, shimmered to an almost painful intensity, and she screamed her release into his mouth.
Gray's shoulders tensed beneath her palms. His eyes opened wide.She stared back for at least ten racing heartbeats, joined, connected, throbbing, neither of them moving.
Deep within her, she felt him, wanted more of him. Her hands trembled on his back. Had he meant to be here, inside her? "Gray?"
He tore himself from her, growling as he flung himself onto his back. Air washed over her body, nearly freezing her, disappointment finishing the job. Just when she thought she would die from the loss, the hurt, he reached for her. Gray gathered her to his side with hands far from steady, reassuring her that all was not lost.
Her fingers skipped a determined path down his chest. "Come on, flyboy. Don't crash and burn on me now."
His chest pumping, he turned to her. A pained smile stretched his face. One of his shaking hands swept back Lori's hair from her face. "Hold on while I regain control of the jet. She's quite a handful today."
Her fingers walked lower. "I'll say."
Gray's eyes slid closed as he groaned, his fist knotting in her hair. "Lori, slow down, hon. You're killing me here. I need to think."
Forget slowing and thinking. Reason could well land their feet back on the floor. "Wanna play wounded Allied pilot and saucy French nurse?"
"Only if I get to be the pilot this time."
Laughing, Lori rolled on top of him, enjoying the lazy trek of his fingers down her spine. "I'm willing to negotiate."
Sex with Gray had always been fun, and she'd missed it. More than she could have imagined. "Please don't say you like me too much to finish this time. I might well have to hurt you."
"No intentions of stopping, hon. I believe we're both way past that right now." He cupped her hips in his hands, keeping her a safe distance above him. "Just taking care of details first."
"Details?"
"Birth control."
"Birth control?" Old arguments stampeded over her. His refusal to consider marriage. Her need for children to love. Her decision to go on the pill to buy them both time to think and explore their feelings.
"Are you still on the pill?" he asked, a desperate edge darkening his words as his grip tightened on her hips.
She'd begun taking them just before their breakup, and had promptly thrown them in the trash after. Eating an entire bowl of raw cookie dough hadn't come close to making her feel better as she'd stared across the room at the wastebasket where she'd pitched her pills and dreams.
Lori flipped onto her back. "I'm not on the pill."
"O-kay." He slung an arm over his forehead as he rushed on, "Condoms, then. Or a diaphragm's fine. No diseases here."
Of course she didn't have any, either. Abstinence had ensured that. It also fostered a lack of readily available birth control. "There's nothing here, Gray. No birth control."
His cheeks puffed on a heavy exhale as he straightened his clothes. "I'll just run to the store—"
"No."
He sagged back. "Okay."
What? She could barely breathe, think, talk, and he gave up with a simple "okay."
"Okay? That's it?" She slugged his arm, hard. "You could at least argue with me! Pretend to be disappointed, you damn jerk!"
The seasoned warrior rubbed his arm with an exaggerated grimace. "Why should I be disappointed? It doesn't have to be over."
Were all men jackasses? Or just this one man she had the unfortunate luck to want more than air? Lori turned away.
His arm snaked around her waist, and he flipped her to her back, looming over her. "We'll do without birth control this time."
Shock twisted her stomach. He couldn't mean what she thought. He couldn't be willing to risk pregnancy. He never had before. Never.
Heaven knew she wasn't ready to risk it. Not now.
A year ago she might have caved to the moment, to the beautiful image of Gray's laughing green eyes peering from the face of their little boy, but now… Things were more confusing than ever.
"It wouldn't be fair, Gray."
"Shhh." His lips nipped along her collarbone, over her breasts.
She tried to shove his hands away, weak halfhearted pushes. "We can't take that risk."
"No risk." He kissed her stomach, rasped his beard-stubbled face over her skin before toying along the edge of her boxers with his teeth. "I'll take care of you, honey."
Realization seeped into her, leaving a bitter, metallic taste in her mouth. Of course he didn't mean to risk a pregnancy with her.
How many times would she make a fool over herself with Gray? Lori grabbed his shoulder to stop him, promising herself she meant it this time.
"We can't. For more reasons than pregnancy." Anger, frustration and old-fashioned heartache made her words harsher than she'd intended.
Wincing inside as well as out, Gray rested his forehead against Lori's smooth stomach. Of course she was right. He'd just lost it. Waking up with her in his arms had wrecked his remaining defenses. Thank God Lori had come to her senses.
Not that it made him feel any better. He hurt. Bad. He needed to touch her, taste her, more than he'd ever needed anything.
And that scared the hell out of him. Their need for each other a year ago had been so strong it nearly destroyed them both. He hadn't thought he could ever want anyone as much as he'd wanted her then.
One night back in her bed proved him wrong.
Lori slid out from under him. Braced on his elbow, Gray watched her charge toward the bathroom as if racing for a fallout shelter with incoming imminent. Those blasted boxers hooked low on her hips. Still, he could feel the moist heat of her clamping around him as it had for that brief moment when he'd lost his mind and slipped inside her.