Susan Phillips - This Heart Of Mine

She was mortified. Sort of. Except it had felt so good. And been so unexpected. "An accident," she managed. "And it's your turn."

"Oh, I'm not in any hurry…" He picked up a lock of her hair, drew it to his nose. "Unlike some people."

The sheen of perspiration on his skin, the way he pressed against her thigh, told her he was in more of a hurry than he wanted to admit. A very big hurry. Funny… she hadn't remembered that about him. Not exactly. She remembered that it had hurt. And now that she thought about it, there'd been a moment when she'd thought she might be too small.

No time like the present to find out if that was true.

She scooted on top of him.

He scooted her back off. Dawdled at the corner of her mouth. When was he going to get to the slam, bam part?

"Why don't you just lie back and rest for a while?" he whispered.

Rest? "Oh, I definitely don't-"

He caught her shoulders, nestled his thumbs in her armpits, started that trail of kisses again. Only this time he kept going.

Before long his hands were at her knees, pushing them far apart. His hair brushed her inner thighs, so sensitive now that she quivered. And then he claimed her with his mouth.

The gentle suction… the sweet thrusts… She couldn't breathe. She caught his head, pleading. Her hips buckled as the waves seized her once again.

This time when she'd calmed, he didn't tease her. Instead, he grabbed the condom she'd forgotten about, eased his body over hers, and gazed down with those green eyes. His skin was hot beneath her hands, and the blaze of late-afternoon sun streaming through the window burnished him with molten gold. She felt his muscles quivering beneath her palms as the effort to hold back became too much for him. Still, he gave her all the time in the world.

She opened… stretched to accept him.

He filled her slowly, kissing her, soothing her. She loved him for the careful care he was taking, and slowly, her body accepted his.

But even when he'd buried himself, he didn't ram at her. Instead, he began a slow, silken thrusting.

It was delicious, but it wasn't enough, and she realized she no longer wanted his restraint. She wanted him free and wild. She wanted him to luxuriate in her body, to use it for his pleasure. Wrapping her legs around him, she grasped his hips and urged him on.

The leash he'd held on his self-control snapped. He plunged. She moaned and met his thrust. It was like being burned in a fire of the senses.

He was too big for her, too strong, too fierce… Absolutely perfect.

The sun burned hotter until it exploded. They flew together into a brilliant crystalline void.

He'd never made love to a woman with a bunny on her panties. But then, there was a lot about making love with Molly that was different from anything he'd experienced. Her enthusiasm, her generosity… Why should he be surprised?

Kevin slid his hand over her hip and thought about how good it had been, even though she'd acted strange at first, almost as if she were trying to convince herself to be afraid of him. He remembered the way she'd stood before him in her bra and bunny panties, with her head high and shoulders back. If an American flag had been waving behind her, she'd have looked like a very sexy Marine Corps recruiting poster. The few, the proud, the cottontailed.

She stirred in his arms and snuffled her nose against his chest, burrowing like one of her storybook pals. But despite the snuffling, the burrowing, and the bunny panties, Molly had been every inch a woman.

And he was in big trouble. In one afternoon, he'd undone everything he'd been trying to accomplish by ignoring her.

She slid her hand from his chest to his belly. Here and there the last shafts of sunlight glazed her hair with little reddish sprinkles like the ones she'd used on yesterday's sugar cookies. He forced himself to remember all the reasons he'd tried so hard to keep her at a distance, starting with the fact that she wasn't going to be part of his life much longer, which could very well piss off her sister, who happened to be the owner of the team he intended to take to the Super Bowl this year.

He couldn't think about all the ways a team owner had of making it tough, even for her star player, not right now. Instead, he thought about how much passion had been locked up inside the small, quirky body of this woman who was and wasn't his wife.

She snuffled again. "You're not a bust-out. As a lover, I mean."

He was glad she couldn't see his smile, because giving her even the smallest advantage generally meant he ended up swimming in the lake with his clothes on. He settled for sarcasm. "I sense a tender moment coming on. Should I get a handkerchief?"

"I just mean that-Well, after last time…"

"Don't tell me."

"It was all I had for comparison."

"For the love of-"

"I know it's not fair. You were asleep. And unwilling. I haven't forgotten that."

He tucked her closer and heard himself say, "Maybe it's time you did."

Her head shot up, and she looked at him with a million emotions on her face, the main one being hope. "What do you mean?"

He rubbed the back of her neck. "I mean, it's over. It's forgotten. And you're forgiven."

Her eyes filled with tears. "You mean it, don't you?"

"I mean it."

"Oh, Kevin… I-"

He sensed a speech coming on, and he wasn't in the mood for any more talk, so he started making love to her all over again.

Yes! Notes for Chik article, "Do Jocks Only Want One Thing?"

Molly sat in the gazebo staring out at the cottages and daydreaming about last night instead of getting ready for the community tea she'd invited everyone to attend on the Common that afternoon. She'd driven into town after breakfast to buy an extra cake along with some soft drinks, but refreshments were the last thing on her mind. She was thinking about Kevin and all the delicious things they'd done.

A car door slammed, distracting her. She looked up to see the paragon he'd been interviewing settle behind the wheel of an aging Crown Victoria. Molly had caught a glimpse of her as she'd arrived for her interview and hated her on sight. Just one look at the no-nonsense reading glasses dangling from a chain around her neck told Molly this woman's cookies would never burn on the bottom.

Kevin appeared on the front porch. Molly automatically waved to him, then wished she hadn't because it made her seem too eager. If only she were one of those sublimely mysterious women who could control a man with the flicker of an eyelash or a single smoldering glance. But neither flickering nor smoldering was her strong point, and Kevin wasn't a man to be controlled anyway.

Roo saw him coming across the Common and scampered to meet him, hoping for a game of catch. Molly's skin grew hot just watching him. Now she knew exactly what every part of the body underneath his black polo shirt and khaki slacks looked like.

She shivered. She didn't doubt he'd enjoyed making love with her last night-she'd been pretty darned good, if she did say so herself-but she knew it hadn't meant the same thing to him that it did to her. He'd been so… everything-tender, rough, thrilling, and more passionate than even her imagination could have invented. This was the most dangerous, the most impossible, the most hopeless crush she'd ever experienced, and last night had made it worse.

Suddenly Kevin stopped walking in midstride. She saw right away what had caught his attention. A nine-year-old boy stood on the edge of the Common holding a football. His name was Cody. His parents had introduced him yesterday when they'd checked in to Green Pastures.

Kevin might not know they finally had younger guests. Between going up in the glider in the afternoon, then locking themselves in the bedroom at the cottage, he wouldn't have seen the children, and she hadn't thought to mention it.

He began walking toward the boy, Roo following along. His stride picked up as he got nearer, until he stopped in front of the child. Molly was too far away to make out what he was saying, but he must have introduced himself because the boy froze up a little, the way kids did when they found themselves in the presence of a well-known athlete.

Kevin rubbed the boy's head to settle him down, then slowly took the football from him. He tossed it back and forth in his hands a few times, spoke to the boy again, then gestured toward the center of the Common. For a moment the boy simply stared at him, as if he couldn't believe what he was hearing. Then his feet flew, and he raced out to catch his first pass from the great Kevin Tucker.

She smiled. It had taken a few decades, but Kevin finally had a kid to play with at the Wind Lake Campgrounds.

Roo joined in the game of catch, yipping at their ankles and generally getting in the way, but neither of them seemed to mind. Cody was a little slow and endearingly awkward, but Kevin kept encouraging him.

"You've got a good arm for a twelve-year-old."

"I'm only nine."

"You're doing great for nine!"

Cody beamed and tried harder. His legs pumped as he ran after the ball, then tried unsuccessfully to duplicate Kevin's form when he tossed it back.

After nearly half an hour of this he finally began to tire, but Kevin was too caught up rewriting history to notice. "You're doing great, Cody. Just relax your arm and put your body into it."

Cody did his best to comply, but he began to dart yearning glances toward his cottage. Kevin, however, focused only on making sure this boy wouldn't suffer the same kind of loneliness he had.

"Hey, Molly!" he called out. "You see what a good arm my friend has here?"

"Yes, I see."

Cody's sneakers were starting to drag, and even Roo was looking tired. But Kevin remained oblivious.

Molly was just getting ready to intervene when the three O'Brian brothers-ages six, nine, and eleven, as she recalled-came running out from the woods behind Jacob's Ladder.

"Hey, Cody! Get your suit on. Our moms said we could go to the beach!"

Cody's face lit up.

Kevin looked thunderstruck. She really should have remembered to tell him that several of the families checking in yesterday had kids. She experienced a sudden, irrational hope that this somehow would make him change his mind about selling the place.

Cody hugged the football to his chest and looked uneasy.

"It's been nice playing with you, Mr. Tucker, but… uh… I have to go play with my friends now. If it's okay?" He edged away backward. "If you… can't find anybody else to play with, I guess-I guess I can come back later."

Kevin cleared his throat. "That's okay. You go on with your friends."

Cody was off like a shot with the three O'Brian boys following.

Kevin approached her slowly. He looked so disconcerted that Molly bit her lip to keep her smile within reasonable boundaries. "Roo'll play with you."

Roo whimpered and crawled under the gazebo.

She rose and walked to the bottom of the steps. "Okay, I'll play with you. But don't throw hard."

He shook his head in bewilderment. "Where did all these kids come from?"

"School's finally out. I told you they'd show up."

"But… how many are here?"

"The three O'Brian boys, and Cody has a baby sister. Two families have one teenage girl each."

He sank down on the step.

She held her amusement in check as she sat next to him. "You'll probably meet them all this afternoon. Tea in the gazebo will be a nice way to kick off a new week."

He didn't say anything, just gazed out at the Common.

She considered it a tribute to her maturity that only a small bubble of laughter escaped. "Sorry your playmate ran away."

He stubbed the heel of his sneaker in the grass. "I made a fool out of myself, didn't I?"

Her heart melted, and she rested her cheek against his shoulder. "Yes, but the world could use more fools like you. You're a very nice man."

He smiled down at her. She smiled back. And that's when it hit her.

This wasn't a crush at all. She'd fallen in love with him.

She was so horrified, she jerked away.

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing!" She started to chatter to cover up her dismay. "There's another family. More children. Checking in today with… some kids. The Smiths. They didn't say how many-how many kids. Amy talked to them."

In love with Kevin Tucker! Please, not that! Hadn't she learned anything? She knew from her childhood how impossible it was to make someone love her, yet she'd once again fallen into that old, destructive pattern. What about all her dreams and hopes? What about her Great Love Story?