Mirror Image

between her thighs.
    He kept kissing her mouth, her neck, her shoulders, while he fondled her breasts. His stroking fingers made the nipples stiff for his mouth. Hotly, wetly, he sucked them with tempered greed, until she was moving beneath him restlessly. He kissed her stomach, her undulating abdomen, the sensitive space between her pelvic bones.
    Avery, lost to the touch of his mouth on her skin, threaded her fingers through his hair and held on tight.
    Between her thighs, she was absurdly slippery, but his fingers dipped into her without intimidation. He discovered that tiny, distended nubbin of flesh between the pouting lips. He pressed it, feathered it, gently rolled it between his fingers.
    She spoke his name on a serrated sigh. Her body quickened. Small shudders began to ripple through her. Reflexively she drew her knees up.
    “I’m hard again.”
    His voice was tinged with wonder. Unintentionally he had spoken aloud the realization that had him mystified. He hadn’t expected to need her again so soon, nor to ever need her as violently as he did now.
    His entrance was surer than before, yet he took more time. When he was fully buried inside her, he turned his face into her neck and gently pulled her skin between his teeth. Avery’s body responded instantly. Her inner muscles flexed, tightly squeezing him. With a low sound, he mindlessly began rocking his hips forward and backward.
    She clung to him. Each rhythmic stroke propelled her closer to the light glimmering at the end of a dark tunnel. Her eyelids fluttered. She raced, harder and faster.
    The light exploded around her brilliantly and she was consumed.
    Tate released a long, low moan. His whole body tensed. He came and came and came, scalding and fierce, until he was completely empty.
    He said nothing when he disengaged his body from hers. He turned away, giving her his back and drawing the sheet over his sweat-beaded shoulders.
    Avery faced the opposite wall, trying to keep her crying silent. Physically it had been the finest sex imaginable, far surpassing anything she had ever experienced from the few lovers she’d had. There had been pitifully few. Relationships required time, and she’d sacrificed most of hers to the pursuit of her career. The obvious difference with this time was the love she had for her partner.
    But for Tate it had started and ended as a biological release. Anger had been his turn-on, not love or even affection. He’d given her a climax, but that had been an obligation considerately fulfilled and nothing more.
    The foreplay had been technically excellent but impersonal. They hadn’t luxuriated in their repletion, though she’d longed to explore his naked body, familiarize her eyes and hands and mouth with every nuance of it. No endearments had been whispered. No vows of love had been pledged. He hadn’t once spoken her name.
    He didn’t even know it.

Thirty-Two
    “Tate, I need a minute of your time.”
    Avery barreled through the previously closed door, interrupting the conference being held in the large den at the ranch house.
    Jack, who had been speaking when she made her peremptory entrance, was left standing in the midst of them with his hand frozen in a gesture and his mouth hanging open.
    “What is it?” Tate asked, looking particularly ill-tempered.
    Eddy was frowning with annoyance; Jack was cursing beneath his breath. Nelson’s displeasure was just as clear, but he made an attempt at civility. “Is it an emergency? Mandy?”
    “No, Nelson. Mandy’s at nursery school.”
    “Is it something Zee can help you with?”
    “I’m afraid not. I need to speak privately to Tate.”
    “We’re in the middle of something here, Carole,” he said testily. “Is it important?”
    “If it weren’t important, I wouldn’t have interrupted you.”
    “I’d rather you wait until we get finished or handle the crisis yourself.”
    She felt her cheeks grow warm with indignation. Since their return home several days earlier, he had gone out of his way to avoid her. It had come as a vast disappointment but only a mild surprise that he hadn’t moved back into the yellow bedroom she occupied. Instead, he’d resumed sleeping alone in the adjoining study.
    Their lovemaking hadn’t drawn them closer. Rather, it had widened the gap between them. The morning following it, they’d barely made eye contact. Words had been few. The mood had been subdued, as though something nefarious had transpired and neither party involved