Free Sharing Sunrise by Judy Griffith Gill Page A

lips with her tongue again. “I do,” she said, and held her breath. “I do want to be kissed.”
    His eyes glittered like green glass, gaze pinned to her mouth. She could feel it like a caress. It was almost as good as a kiss. Almost. She saw his throat work as he swallowed. “But … not by me.” His voice was hoarse. In his words she thought she head a plea.
    He sounded almost as scared as she felt. Oh, God, was that it? Was he afraid to make a move? Was he as fearful of rejection as she was? Gathering up her courage, she murmured, “Oh, yes, Rolph. By you.” Her voice was soft and breathless. Her heart was in her throat. She moistened her lips once more, and watched his eyes flicker, his mouth harden. His hands moved restlessly on her back, then encircled her waist, lightly, as he set her back from him.
    He swallowed hard again and smiled, spoke, also lightly. “Honey, it’s the music, the atmosphere, the dancing. Anyone would do.”
    “Rolph …” She moved in closer again, slipped one hand behind his neck, filtered her fingers into the soft, tightly curled hair there and sighed. “Do you really believe that?”
    He drew in a deep, unsteady breath. “Baby, I have to believe that.”
    “Why?”
    God! The soft question was enough to stop him in his tracks. Good question, that one. He’d thought he knew the answer, but looking at her, he found the substance of it slipping away. Her eyes were deep pools of rich green. Tendrils of her golden hair hung loose because he’d toyed with it once too often, flicked one too many pin onto the floor. One thin strap of her green dress hung down over her shoulder. Her scent enfolded him with a heady haze of desire that was rapidly becoming rampant need, and that need would be obvious to her if he couldn’t find a way to move apart from her. But those lips were plump, full, tempting, moist and ready. Her eyes were wide and expectant. Her fingers tightened in his hair. Her round breasts moved against his chest as she breathed. Why not kiss her? Why not taste her? Why not accept what she offered so sweetly, so innocently? Why—
    “Why?” she said again, hardly more than a whisper, but her breath was warm and sweet and tinged with wine as it came, carrying the word. It fanned across his face and he suppressed a groan as he firmly set her back from him.
    “Because you’ve had too much wine. We both have. It would be wrong. And I like you. I … respect you. I don’t want to do the wrong thing with you. To you. We’ve been friends for a long time. We work together. And I’m older than you are, more experienced. I know what … ambience can do to create a mood, elicit feelings. And I know how false those feelings can be.”
    As false as the color of those eyes I’m staring into. As false as the shade of the soft hair that persists in drawing my fingers into it. He made himself notice those things, made himself remember, though it was hard. Across the room, he saw the Englishman, Robin Ames, heading toward the exit door. Robin, a man she’d met in Hong Kong. How many men would come tapping her on the shoulder over the years, reminding her of times past, of places visited? Far away places with strange-sounding names …
    “What makes you so sure those feelings are false?”
    He didn’t know, he just knew they had to be. False and transient. As transient as everything else in her life. “False feelings, a created mood, a brief, bright light that would flicker and die, however beautiful it might be while it burned,” he said. “That’s not what I’m looking for, Marian. That’s not what I want out of life. I want reality. Stability.”
    Hurt welled up inside her but she’d had years of practice hiding things like that. She arched her brows and smiled. “And I’m not real?” She inched closer. “Is that what you’re saying?”
    “What I’m saying is that you’re wasting your time flirting with me, little girl, because I have no intention of wasting my time