Free Season of Storm by Sellers Alexandra Page B

it."
    "What are you going to do?" Her high voice was painful even to her own ears. "Have you decided what you're going to do?"
    He didn't answer, and with a strange, unfamiliar little snap her panic turned to rage. For the second time she flung herself bodily at him, emotion driving her beyond reason.
    " Answer me!" she demanded.  
    Johnny Winterhawk whirled, and with a loud crash the frying pan sailed to the floor, spilling a mess of onions and melted butter as it went. Ignoring it, he caught her by one wrist and reached for the other, but this time his strength did not outweigh her angry litheness. She dragged and twisted against his firm grasp, trying to pull him off balance, and aimed for his head with her flailing free hand.
    Like a practised boxer, he swung his upper body easily backward, allowing her to move across the floor, but not letting go her wrist.
    "Stop it," he said in a gentle, low-voiced command, and even when he moved his head to dodge her swinging blows, his dark eyes never left hers.
    "Damn you, damn you!" she cried. "You're going to kill me, and you haven't got the guts to admit it!"
    Her bare foot came in contact with a thick patch of hot butter and onion, and her feet shot out from under her so suddenly that she was flat on the floor before she knew it, with Johnny Winterhawk coming down on top of her.
    He managed to break his fall a little, letting go her wrist to land with a hand at each side of her head, but still his body was full-length along hers, and suddenly Smith was breathless with terror.
    "Get away from me!" she screeched.
    "Stop it," Johnny Winterhawk answered her, in the same low voice as before. She tried to twist away from him, then stopped on a hiss of pain.
    Her long hair was tangled all around her, fanning out on the floor under his hands; she couldn't move her head without tearing her scalp. She gritted her teeth and hung onto reason with a superhuman effort.
    "Will you please get off me?" she said with forced calm. "You're pulling my hair."
    Johnny Winterhawk raised a hand to straighten her hair, lifting the long silky amber strands away from her eyes and face. His strong fingers were gentle and soothing along her cheeks and forehead, and across her just-parted lips. His dark eyes looked deep into hers as her breath shuddered in her throat.
    Then it was not his fingers but his thumb that was against her lips, and his touch was no longer gentle. Shulamith's pulse began to pound in her temples. She swallowed convulsively, then her lips parted again, and she heard her own breath hiss between them. She waited, watching him, hypnotized by the dark flame in his eyes, as certain as if it were written in letters of fire that Johnny Winterhawk wanted to fight the compelling magnetism that was alive between them, that he was trying to force himself to let her go.
    "Damn it," Johnny Winterhawk breathed hoarsely, and his mouth came down and covered hers.
    Smith closed her eyes to reeling darkness, and her small competent hand closed convulsively against his chest into the thick warmth of his sweater. Suddenly the kiss was all she had ever wanted out of life, and the small involuntary moan of need she heard came from her own throat.
    The sound of it seemed to ignite something in him. His body leaped against hers, and he gathered her to him, one arm sliding under her head, his hand clenching tightly around her upper arm.
    His fingers burned the side of her breast, and suddenly every inch of her skin was electrically alive. She wrapped her arm up around his neck and clung to him as his tongue toyed in the soft warmth of her mouth.
    When he lifted his lips at last her head fell back over his supporting arm, and she bared her neck to him in instinctive animal surrender. She felt his breath against the soft hollow of her throat, and her body leapt in a small, responsive spasm.
    Johnny Winterhawk groaned as his lips pressed against her; and then suddenly and without warning he let her go, rolling