Mack said quietly, looking directly into Heather’s eyes. “I want—I need—to connect with you and your daughters, Heather. I hope you’ll grant me that privilege.”
She couldn’t breathe, Heather thought suddenly. The soft, rumbly timbre of Mack’s voice, combined with those mesmerizing dark eyes of his, was stealing the very breath from her body.
Mack Marshall was so big, so powerful, so blatantly male, that his very essence seemed to fill the room to overflowing, leaving no space for her, no air to breathe.
Oh, this was frightening, yet somewhere deep within her was a hum of excitement, as well. A heightened awareness of her own femininity as nothing she’d ever experienced before.
No, she didn’t want to see Mack again, didn’t want him in her home, close to her, unsettling her, throwing her so off kilter. No.
“Heather?” Mack said. “May I come back tomorrow? You name the time and I’ll be here. Please?”
“Three o’clock,” Heather heard herself say, then shook her head slightly, stunned at her own response. She sighed in defeat. “The girls get home from school about two-thirty. I’ll explain things to them while we’re sharing our snack, then you can arrive and—oh, I hope I’m doing the right thing.”
“You are. Believe me, you are,” Mack said, smiling. “Thank you, Heather, more than I can begin to express to you. I’ll see you tomorrow afternoon at three o’clock sharp. Good night.”
Mack extended his right hand toward Heather and she stared at it for a long moment before placing her right hand in his. He gripped her hand firmly, but didn’t release it from his grasp.
“Thank you again,” he said.
Heather nodded, told herself to retrieve her hand, but didn’t move.
Heat, she registered. There was a strange heat traveling up her arm and across her breasts, causing them to feel heavy and achy, so strange and— She could feel the calluses on Mack’s hand, which was so large it totally covered hers. There was power in that hand, but he was holding hers with just the right amount of gentleness and, dear heaven, the heat.
Heather pulled her hand free and hoped Mack didn’t see the shuddering breath she took in the next instant.
Mack turned and moved to the door, and Heather followed to lock up behind him.
“Until tomorrow,” he said.
“Yes,” she said, her voice hardly above a whisper.
Mack left the house and Heather closed and locked the door behind him. She leaned her forehead against the worn wood.
How was it possible, she thought, that a simple knock on the front door could turn her entire world topsy-turvy?
Oh, Heather, stop overreacting, she admonished herself as she spun around and headed for the kitchen to make the almost-forgotten lunches. Anyone would be a tad shaken up to have a stranger suddenly appear on the doorstep and claim to be a long-lost relative.
Her world wasn’t topsy-turvy, as her mind had so dramatically described it. It was simply changed a little by the arrival of Mack Marshall. She could handle this. She just needed some rejuvenating sleep, would have this development in its proper perspective in the light of the new day.
“Right,” she said dryly as she yanked open the refrigerator door. “If that’s true, then why do I have a sneaking suspicion that as of three o’clock tomorrow afternoon my life is never going to be quite the same again?”
Chapter Two
Mack muttered several earthy expletives, tossed back the blankets on the bed, then crossed the room to the large bathroom.
He tore the paper off one of the hotel glasses, filled the glass and swallowed the pill the doctor had prescribed for him when he’d left the hospital in New York City.
He’d been determined to deal with the pain in his shoulder with nothing stronger than aspirin, he fumed, returning to the bed. But he’d been tossing and turning so much, he’d aggravated his wound to the point that he would never be able to sleep with such throbbing pain tormenting him.
Mack sighed and gave himself a firm directive to relax, turn off his mind and get some much-needed sleep. He was bone-tired and had jet lag, to boot.
His doctor had been none too pleased with Mack’s announcement that he was flying to Arizona. The doc had told him that he was far from recovered from the trauma to his body, his energy level was below par, and the wound itself was not totally healed.
Mack had nodded in all the right places as the physician stated his concerns, then told the doctor that the trip could not be postponed any longer and he was leaving the next day.
And here he was, he thought, in the hot, dusty city of Tucson, having accomplished the first step of his mission. He’d met Heather Marshall.
Heather, he mused. Pretty name. Pretty lady. She could, in fact, be stunningly beautiful if she was decked out in an expensive evening dress, had just a touch of makeup on, maybe some glittering jewelry to wear, and allowed her dark hair to tumble down her back in what would be a raven cascade.
Mack frowned into the darkness.
He was mentally transforming Heather into one of the women he was accustomed to dating, one of the wealthy, jet-set gals who wore only the finest and expected to be wined and dined at five-star establishments. He was automatically placing Heather in a social scene where she obviously had never been.
Why was he doing that? Perhaps because it created a sense of familiarity, of knowing what to say to the woman in question, how to flatter her and make her feel special and pampered as she fully expected to be. He was very, very good at that, and the number of women who were always eager to learn that he was once again in New York was proof of that puddin’.
But Heather Marshall? She was from a different world altogether. She lived in a shabby little house in a crummy neighborhood, and wore clothes that had been washed so many times they were nearly void of color.
And she was a mother, for Pete’s sake. Did he know any women who were mothers? No, he didn’t think he did. What did a guy say to a mother once he’d gushed about how cute her kids were? Hell, what did a man say to six-year-old twin girls?
He really wanted—needed—to connect with Heather and her daughters, but he was so out of his league it was a crime. There had to be something, some common ground he could find. Like…hell, like what?
Mack’s frown deepened as he felt a sudden tingling heat in the palm of his right hand, and recalled how delicate and feminine Heather’s hand had felt encased in his. He’d been very, very aware of Heather as a woman at that moment, had experienced a jolt of…of lust, he supposed, when he’d held her hand and looked into the depths of her lovely dark eyes.
Ah, now there was a common ground he understood. Good old-fashioned sex, a healthy, physical release. The women he associated with were on the same wavelength on the subject. There were no strings, no commitments. That was how he’d operated his entire adult life, and it had served his purposes just fine, with no complaints from the female contingent.
But there was no way on earth that Heather Marshall operated in that arena. Not a chance. She was hearth, home and motherhood. She probably even baked apple pies.
No, the common ground between him and Heather was not going to be falling into bed together. Even a hint of such a thing would probably get him shot in the other shoulder by the feisty Ms. Marshall.
Man, oh, man, this was complicated. He was determined to cement a family relationship with Heather and her daughters. It had to happen, it just had to. The remembrance of believing he was about to die and realizing no one would give a damn caused a cold fist to tighten in his gut. He never wanted to relive that chilling loneliness. No, never again.
Heather and her girls were his link to having a family, because he sure didn’t intend to