Free Can't Stop Loving You by Peggy Webb

totally
desirable. And she’d lost control because of him.
    An exultation all out of proportion to the
deed filled him. Finally she’d shown him some genuine emotion.
    What did it mean?
    Nothing,
he told himself.
    They couldn’t go back. It would be the same
all over again. She’d cover whatever it was that had made her leave
in the first place, and he’d pretend her leaving really hadn’t
mattered at all.
    Maybe if the home were a stage, the two of
them could make it as a team, but home was not a place to act; it
was a place to be
real.
He wondered if either of them were
capable of being real.
    “Why did that cake have to be chocolate?”
Grinning, she turned to him.
    Irresistible
.
    “You have chocolate here.” He rubbed a spot
on her cheek.
    She lifted her face. “Hmmm.”
    Dangerous
.
    He turned his attentions to the walls and
applied what Fanny Mae at the orphanage used to call
elbow
grease.
    “Use elbow grease,” the cook used to say
after he’d been sent to clean the kitchen as punishment for one of
his many escapades. “It’ll build muscles.”
    “What do I need muscles for? I got a
brain.”
    “Wait till you’re grown. Then you’ll see what
you need muscles for.”
    Dear old Fannie Mae had been right. By the
time he was sixteen and out of the orphanage, he had muscles... and
women falling at his feet wherever he went.
    He followed a line of chocolate stain,
excruciatingly aware that it put him closer to Helen.
    He didn’t want women swooning at his feet.
Only Helen.
    Her perfume was intoxicating. He took a deep
breath, drinking her fragrance in. Long after she’d gone, the
bedroom had smelled like her. He’d finally had to move into the
guest room in order to get some sleep.
    “Oops.” Her hip bumped against him.
“Sorry.”
    “It’s all right.”
    It wasn’t. The ease between them had lowered
barriers he’d kept in place. If he didn’t get out of the kitchen
with her, he’d soon be out of control.
    He put on some speed.
    “I’m impressed,” Helen said. “Have you ever
thought of opening a cleaning service?”
    “Only before every performance.”
    With Helen he didn’t have to explain. The
great thing about being married to another artist was that she
perfectly understood stage fright, that quick burst of adrenaline
that pumped through the system each time he stood in the wings,
awaiting his cue.
    “Me, too.” Helen leaned back to inspect the
wall. “All done. Thanks, Brick.”
    She held out her hand. He started to take it,
and then he knew her hand would not be enough, not tonight.
    Without a word he swept her into his
arms.
    She stiffened momentarily, her eyes wide and
luminous, then she settled back as if she belonged there.
    She did. She would always belong there.
    Heavy with the knowledge that he’d lost her,
Brick switched off the kitchen light and carried her up the stairs.
She rested her face in the curve of his shoulder. Her breath warmed
his skin.
    She felt so right, so natural.
    He wished the stairs would go on forever. He
wished the night would never end.
    His footsteps made no sound in the plush
carpet of the hallway. As he approached her bedroom door, his
heartbeat accelerated. How many times had he carried Helen to bed?
How many times had he spread her upon the covers and been welcomed
into her soft, sweet arms? How many ways had he expressed his love
for her? How many ways had she expressed hers for him?
    The door creaked open. A shaft of moonlight
illuminated the antique bed. Sheer curtains hung from the
four-poster. A draft coming from the hall set the curtains
swaying.
    His throat was dry, his eyes moist. His heart
hurt. His groin ached.
    Helen
.
    Did he whisper her name or was it merely a
cry of his heart?
    She placed one hand on his cheek, softly,
tenderly. He could see her heart pulsing through the blue veins in
her slender neck.
    One kiss, and then he would go. He pressed
his lips against the blue vein, felt the beat of her heart, tasted
the sweetness of