"Yes." She smiled against his chest and kissed it gently, the damp hairs tickling her nose. He was trembling faintly from the exertion, just as she was. "It's different, every time," she said.

"It's supposed to be. After the baby comes, and you've recovered, I'll teach you some other ways to do this." His hands caressed her smooth, bare back. "A few of them are pretty rough and demanding, so we'll save those until you aren't in this sweet condition."

She lifted her head and looked into his pale, loving eyes. "Pa.s.sion can be violent, they say. That's what I was always afraid of. But now it isn't scary anymore." She smiled and he relaxed, as if he'd been holding his breath. "I love loving you," she whispered. "Can we do it again?"

He smiled slowly, wickedly. "I don't know. Can we?"

She was learning things already. Secrets. She moved very delicately, first one way, then the other. Then she bent her head and bit him gently. Seconds later, his breath expelled in a rush and she smiled.

"Yes," she whispered back, her eyes bright with feminine triumph. "Oh, yes, we can...!"

The baby came a little over seven months later, and he wasn't twins, but as Ryder remarked, he sounded like them. They brought him home from the hospital and were immediately pounced upon by a radiant new grandmother who stared down at him in her arms and spent several long minutes trying to decide who he favored.

"She'll come to the conclusion that he looks like her," Ryder whispered as they watched Jean with little Clellan Donald Calaway.

"Yes, I know," she murmured, resting her head on his shoulder with a contented sigh. "We're rather superfluous, you know. We only had him for Mama."

"I see what you mean." He looked down at her, searching her weary eyes. "I'll carry you up in a minute and put you to bed. It's been a long three days."

"A wonderful three days," she replied, her heart in the eyes that adored him. "Are you really happy with me?"

He touched her face with a hand that very nearly trembled. "You're everything," he said huskily. "The world."

Love like that was a responsibility, she thought, watching him. But one she was willing to a.s.sume. She felt the same way about him. It wasn't until she'd seen his bedroom for the first time that she'd known how he felt. Once they were married, all the photographs of her came out of hiding. Those, and the painting that now hung over the mantel.

Her eyes went past him to the fireplace, up to the beautiful oil painting of a young girl in a flowing pink dress, sitting in a patch of wildflowers, her long black hair windblown, her black eyes, like her pink mouth, smiling sweetly. He'd had it done secretly when she was eighteen, and if she needed any proof of how he felt about her, seeing that painting gave it to her. It was still overwhelming when she realized just how deeply, how desperately, he loved her.

"It was my solace all those years we were apart," he said, following her gaze to the painting. "A very private memory of a day I took you and Eve walking, and you wore that dress. I fell in love with you then."

"I fell in love with you about the same time. I'm sorry I was such a coward. I wasted years of our lives."

"No. You used them, to grow up, to become mature, to learn what love really was. I'm sorry for the pain you suffered, but then, it's the bad times that make us the people we are, Ivy. No character ever got shaped by sun and smooth sailing all the time."

She smiled. "I guess not. The main thing is that we're together now." She glanced toward Jean, who still held their son in her arms. "All this, and a baby, too. Talk about counting your blessings."

"I couldn't begin to count mine." He pressed her cheek back against his chest and closed his eyes.

"Nor I," she agreed softly.

Across from them young Clellan opened his eyes and looked up at his cooing grandmother with wide blue eyes.

"Why, I've decided who he favours," Jean exclaimed with a radiant smile. "He looks just like me!"

The other two occupants of the room burst out laughing, and a puzzled grandmother shrugged with faint curiosity and ignored them. She was much too happy comparing her eyes to the baby's to wonder what they found so amusing, anyway.

New York Times Bestselling Author.

He's everything she fears...and everything she wants.

Mercenary by name and by nature, Carson is a Lakota Sioux who stays to himself and never keeps women around long enough for anything emotional to develop. But working with his friend Cash Grier on a complex murder investigation provides Carson with another kind of fun-shocking Cash's sweet-but-traditional secretary, Carlie Blair, with tales of his latest conquests.

Then Carlie lands in deep trouble. She saw something she shouldn't have, and now the face of a criminal is stored permanently in her photographic memory...and Carlie is the key piece of evidence that could implicate a popular politician in the murder case.

Her only protection is Carson-the man she once despised. But when she learns that Carson is more than just a tough guy, Carlie realizes she's endangered herself further. Because now her only chance to live means losing her heart to the most dangerous kind of man....

end.