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  She came right off the sofa, a tiny, shocked cry pulsing out of her throat, a sound she’d never heard from it before.

  “Shh,” he whispered gruffly. “They’ll hear.”

  She bit her lower lip and pulled his head closer, her fingers spearing through his thick, wavy black hair as his mouth made magic on her body.

  “Glory!” she moaned. “Mikey, do it harder,” she whispered frantically. “Harder!”

  “I’ll hurt you,” he groaned.

  “No. You won’t. Please...!”

  He took all of her firm breast into his mouth and his tongue worked on the nipple until she was writhing wildly under the sudden heavy press of his body.

  One big hand was under her hip, grinding her against the growing hardness of him, letting her feel his need. It was desperate.

  She felt guilty. She was inciting him, and they couldn’t be intimate. She remembered suddenly what he’d told her about heavy petting, that he could have the clothes out of the way and be inside her in less time than it would take to react.

  She thought about feeling him inside her, and she shivered with the sudden need.

  Her nails bit into the back of his head as she held it closer, arching so that he could feed more easily on her breast. She shivered rhythmically as he suckled her, harder and harder. All at once she arched and sobbed and felt a shaft of pleasure pierce her that was beyond anything she’d ever dreamed. She convulsed, shuddered, flew up into the clouds and exploded.

  Then she cried, embarrassed. He cuddled her close, denying his starved body the release it begged for. “It’s all right,” he whispered. “It’s natural, baby. It’s all right.”

  “It really is? Natural, I mean?” she whispered brokenly.

  He laughed softly. “That only happens to one woman in a hundred,” he said. “Maybe one in a thousand. I’ve never seen it happen to a woman I was with.” His mouth brushed over hers. “God, what a thrill it was! You’ve never felt it, have you?”

  “Not...until now,” she managed.

  He drew in a rough breath. “I’m better than I thought I was,” he teased.

  She laughed. “You’re better than I thought you were, and that’s saying something.”

  He lifted his head and looked down at her bare breasts. “You know that you belong to me, don’t you?” he asked, and met her eyes with his. They were solemn. “You’re mine, Bernie.”

  She melted into the sofa under the hard, sweet pressure of his body. “Yes. I know it.”

  He moved over her, his body pressing her down. He fought his shirt out of the way so that his muscular hair-roughened chest was rubbing against her bare breasts. He shivered.

  She did, too. “If you want to,” she said unsteadily, “I will.”

  “Right here?” he asked huskily.

  “Right here.”

  “You don’t know how much I want to,” he bit off.

  She moved her hips just a tiny bit. “Oh, yes, I do,” she said, feeling him swell even more.

  “Baby,” he whispered. He moved between her legs and pushed up, so that he was intimately pressed against the heart of her.

  She sobbed, because it was beyond anything she’d felt before. Her legs moved apart, inviting him.

  “It would have to be quick,” he said gruffly. “Very quick. And it will probably hurt.”

  “I don’t...care,” she said unsteadily.

  He kissed her softly, and his hand went under the band of her slacks, under her briefs. She caught his wrist, embarrassed.

  He lifted his head. “You have to let me do this,” he whispered, his voice shaken. “I have to know how careful I need to be with you. Okay?”

  She bit her lip. “I’ve never...”

  “I know that. But you belong to me.”

  She let her body relax, let the hardness of him fit against her so that it was heaven to feel. “Yes,” she said, her voice tender, her eyes wide and rapt on his taut face.

  His hand smoothed over her belly and he thought of a baby who would look like her or like himself. He had something to use, but he didn’t want to use it. And he didn’t want to take her here in a rush, the way he’d taken women in his youth. She would need time, lots of time, and he couldn’t give it to her if they went too far.

  His fingers moved down. She hesitated and tightened as he suddenly began to probe where she was most a woman. She bit her lip hard enough to draw blood as he explored her intimately. Even loving him as she did, it was hard to give up control to another person.

  He whispered, almost groaning as he drew his fingers back and smoothed them over her stomach, “It will hurt like hell, and I’m not sure I could even get through the barrier, you understand?”

  “Oh!” She winced.

  “Sorry.” He rolled over onto his side and pulled her into his arms, grinding her breasts into his chest. “No, I’m sorry. I never meant to take it this far.” His arms contracted. “God, Bernie, I want to get you pregnant so badly...!”

  He kissed her shocked mouth and groaned again as he pushed her hips closer to his. “I want you. I want to go inside you, so deep, so hard, that you’ll shoot up like a rocket!”

  She flushed under the pressure of his hard mouth, moaning as she felt him move her rhythmically against his hips. “I’m so sorry...”

  He managed a husky laugh. “Think of it as a chastity belt. It will keep me in line until we can make things legal.”

  She hid her face against his throat. Make it legal. Could he mean that he wanted to marry her? She was so entranced that she didn’t even hear footsteps in the hall.

  Neither did Mikey, who was kissing her as if he couldn’t manage to stop.

  The hard, insistent knock on the door and the rattling of the locked doorknob broke them apart.

  “Supper!” Sari called.

  Mikey laughed. “Okay! We’ll be right there.”

  “I have a master key, you know. It fits all the locks,” Sari threatened.

  Bernie went beet-red. Mikey just chuckled. “We’re behaving, starting right now!”

  There was a laugh outside the door. “Fair warning. Five minutes and I unlock the door.”

  “Got it!” Mikey called.

  Footsteps retreated.

  Mikey took one long, last look at Bernie’s half-nude body and groaned. “I hate dressing you,” he muttered, as he refastened her bra and pulled her blouse down.

  “I hate dressing you, too,” she teased as she buttoned his shirt again. “I love the way you look undressed.”

  “Yeah. I feel exactly the same way about you.”

  “You’re not upset by what I told you?” she asked, worried.

  He cocked his head and stared at her. “I’ve done things almost as bad as your grandfather,” he said flatly. “I can’t sit in judgment on somebody else. Not my business. But now that you know what my business is,” he added quietly, “you have to decide if you can live with it. There’s no way I’ll give it up. I can’t. It’s for life.”

  She was beginning to realize that even though he ran an honest gaming hotel in Las Vegas, he was firmly entrenched with a group that routinely broke the law. He could go to prison in certain circumstances. She’d have to be in the company of people who thought of crime as a way of life, an occupation. She’d be the outsider. Would the women in his organization hate her? And what about the women he’d had before her? Would they be around? Would they be like Jessie and make her life miserable?

  “Deep thoughts, huh?” he asked quietly.

  “Very deep.” She drew in a breath. “Mikey, I’m not like you. I don’t even jaywalk. My great-grandfather was a United States Marshal. I have a cousin who’s a Texas Ranger. Law enforcement runs through my whole family.”

  “I see,” he said heavily. “You don’t think you could handle it.”

  “No!” She
went close to him. “I’d be the outsider. The freak. They wouldn’t accept me.”

  “Baloney,” he mused. He smiled as he tangled his fingers in her hair. “You have no idea how much they’d accept you. They’d go places with you, protect you if you needed protection. They’d sit with you when you were sick, when you have flares. It’s another whole world, baby. One you’ve never seen. It’s violent, yes. But the people are just like anybody else. The women are a close-knit group, because there’s always some danger involved that the men have to handle.” He winced at her expression. “I don’t know any other way of life, Bernie,” he concluded. “I can’t change what I am, what I do.” He shrugged. “I don’t want to. If that’s selfish, I’m selfish.”

  She pressed herself close to him, sliding her arms around him. “I can try,” she whispered.

  His heart jumped. It lifted as if a dark cloud had dissipated in the sunlight. His arms tightened around her. “That’s all I ask,” he said. “That’s all I want.”

  She smiled and closed her eyes.

  There was a click and the door opened. Sari looked in with pursed lips when they turned toward her. She chuckled. “I warned you,” she said, lifting the key to show them. “Supper.”

  Mikey grinned. “We’re right behind you.”

  “Yes,” Bernie agreed.

  Mikey linked her fingers with his and the two of them looked, to Sari, like two halves of a whole. She had no doubt that there would be a wedding in the future.

  Bernie clung to his hand and smiled. She looked up at Mikey with wonder, with adoration.

  He saw that look and it made him feel a foot taller. His fingers contracted gently around hers. She tightened her own grip. She’d never known such wonder, such joy. It spilled out around her like sunshine. She smiled. So did Mikey. They both knew where this was leading, now more than ever.

  Chapter Eleven

  Supper was as uproarious as lunch had been. Paul had a dozen stories of things that had happened to him in the course of his duties. Foremost among those stories was the one he’d heard from Sari about agent Murdock. He recited it for Mikey and chuckled at his cousin’s amusement.

  “I like Olivia,” Mikey said. “She seems very nice.”

  “She is,” Bernie agreed. “Mr. Kemp hired her so that there would be another paralegal in the office on the days I can’t work,” she added, and felt uncomfortable talking about her limitations.

  “You do very well, considering your obstacles,” Sari told her. “We don’t think of you as handicapped, you know,” she added. “You have a disability. Lots of people have them. Look at poor Glory. She had dangerously high blood pressure and a light heart attack. But she overcame that to work here, where she and her husband and little boy live.”

  “I’d love a little boy,” Mikey said, glancing at Bernie, who flushed. “Or a little girl. I’ll bet little girls are sweet.”

  Bernie laughed. “I was never sweet,” she teased. “I got into so much trouble when I was small. The worst time was when I climbed into the corncrib and couldn’t get out, and a king snake decided to come in with me. He was huge. Over six feet long. I was terrified. But he didn’t strike at me or even threaten me. He just stretched out on the corn and looked at me.”

  “Probably hunting rodents,” Sari remarked. “They love corn.”

  “Probably,” Bernie agreed. “All in all, he was a very polite snake. He didn’t even seem bothered when Daddy came to find me and lifted me out of the corncrib.”

  “He might also have just eaten a few rats and was feeling lazy,” Paul chuckled.

  “Equally possible,” Bernie laughed.

  “Well, I’ve got briefs to read,” Sari said.

  “And I’ve got cases to work,” Paul added as they both got to their feet. “You two can watch movies or just sit in the conservatory and watch the plants grow. You’re both always welcome. Anytime.”

  “Thanks, Paul,” Bernie said.

  Mikey echoed the sentiment.

  They were left with Mandy, who started to clear away the dishes. “You two want coffee?” she asked with a warm smile.

  “Not for me,” Mikey said. “I don’t sleep good. It keeps me awake.”

  “Me, too,” Bernie said.

  Mikey stood up and helped Bernie out of her chair. “I think we’ll go watch Sari’s plants grow for a while, if you don’t mind.”

  “Help yourselves,” she said with a knowing grin.

  Mikey led Bernie into the conservatory and locked the door.

  “Nobody’s likely to try it, but who knows?” Mikey teased. He took Bernie into his arms and kissed her hungrily. “Dessert,” he whispered. “Sweeter than cake.”

  “Sweeter than honey,” she agreed on a moan.

  He picked her up and sat down with her in his lap, kissing her all the while.

  She didn’t protest his hands under her blouse. He was so familiar to her now, so dear, that she welcomed anything he did.

  He knew that, and it kept him honest. He didn’t want to take advantage of an attraction she couldn’t help. She was very innocent. It made his head spin, that lack of sophistication. He loved it.

  He eased her blouse and bra down to her waist and unbuttoned his shirt, pulling her hungrily inside it.

  “Oh, glory,” she choked when she felt thick, soft hair and warm muscles against her bare breasts. Her face sank into his throat while he caressed her.

  “We’re good together,” he whispered. “Better than I dreamed. God, I want you!”

  Her arms tightened around his neck. “I want you, too,” she whispered back.

  His hands smoothed over her hard-tipped breasts. “We’ve talked around it,” he said after a minute. “But not any particulars.” His hands moved her away and he looked at her breasts with possession and appreciation. “You’re beautiful like this, Bernie. It makes me hungry just to hold you. But this goes to my head like whiskey.”

  She arched backward, her body demanding, hungry, ignoring her mind’s attempt to be sensible.

  “This what you want, sweetheart?” he whispered, and his mouth swallowed up one small, taut breast almost whole.

  She moaned and shivered.

  “I thought so.” His voice was rough, but his mouth was tender as he worked at the hard nipple slowly, tenderly, with a growing suction that very soon made her go stiff and then suddenly burst with pleasure that made her whole body convulse in his arms.

  “God, I love this,” he groaned against her breast. “I love that I can make you go off like a rocket when I suckle you!”

  Her nails dug into him. It was a little embarrassing, but she was too exhausted with pleasure, with satisfaction, to protest. She shivered and clung to him in the aftermath. “I never felt anything like it in my whole life,” she said brokenly. “It embarrasses me...”

  His arms contracted. “Don’t you dare be ashamed of something so beautiful,” he whispered at her ear. “No two people ever belonged to each other more than we do right this minute, Bernie.”

  She swallowed, hard. “Do you feel that, too?”

  He chuckled and turned her just a little, so that her hips were pressed to that part of him that was male and very hard. “Do you feel this?”

  “Mikey!” she protested.

  “A man can’t fake that, honey,” he said at her ear. “It’s as honest as the way you react when I put my mouth on you.” He drew back and looked down at her with pure possession. “There’s nobody in the world like you.”

  She reached up and touched his cheek. “Or like you,” she said solemnly.

  He bent his dark head and smoothed his mouth over her breast tenderly. He drew in a breath. “We need to talk.”

  “We are.”

  “We need to talk when we’re both dressed,” he said with a droll smile.

  “Oh.”

  He put her
clothes back on and buttoned his shirt. When they were calmer, he drew her onto the love seat and sat holding her hand.

  “Bernie, I’m not proud of what I’m about to tell you. But there’s more about me that you need to know.” He drew in a breath. “My family has belonged to what’s known to outsiders as La Cosa Nostra for three generations. My father died working for them. I’ve been with Tony Garza since I was sixteen. I don’t know any other way of life.”

  “You mean, you work outside the law,” she said very calmly.

  “That’s exactly what I mean.” He studied her face. She was a little pale, but she wasn’t trying to get away from him. “We’re like normal people. We pay our taxes, go to church, work for charitable causes, all that stuff. We just earn our living in ways that aren’t conventional.”

  “I told you that I watched The Godfather movies,” she said.

  He brushed her disheveled hair back from her face. “That was a sanitized version of what really goes on,” he said after a minute. “I won’t, I can’t, tell you how brutal it can be. You don’t ever quit. And you don’t rat out your associates. There are deadly penalties for that. Remember what I told you about Paulie’s family?”

  She just nodded. Her eyes were sketching his hard face as if she were painting it.

  “I could go to jail one day,” he persisted. “I could die.”

  “A meteor could land on the boardinghouse and take us all out,” she said matter-of-factly. “Nobody is ever guaranteed even one more day.”

  He just looked at her.

  “I’m not Italian,” she said. “Would that make me an outsider?”

  He smiled slowly. “The wives come from all sorts of backgrounds,” he said, and noticed her flush at the word. “Some are American. Some are Italian and Spanish, even Polish. But they have one thing in common and that’s family. We all belong to each other. If you shared that life with me,” he said, “you’d be part of it. You’d never be an outsider. And if anything happened, anything at all, you’d be taken care of as long as you live. That’s how it works.”