He couldn't run that risk tonight. He had spent too much time tearing up what was left of his conscience and flogging what was left of his soul. He felt too beaten, too battered, and she was too pretty and too good.
Too good for the like of you, Jack…
She stared at him, her eyes as dark as midnight, as uncertain as a child's. In spite of all she'd been through, an aura of innocence still clung about her like a fading perfume. Like Evie. God, what pain that thought brought with it! If he touched her, he would sully her innocence, destroy it as he had destroyed Evie. But he wasn't strong enough to be noble, wasn't good enough to do the right thing. He was a bastard and a user and worse, a man caught between what he was and what he wanted. And he was so damn tired of being alone…
"You don' trust me," he whispered, tenderly brushing her hair from her eyes. He grazed his fingertips along the delicate line of her cheekbone. "You shouldn't. I'm bad for you."
The warning was diluted to nothing by the sadness in his face. His mouth twisted into a half smile that was cynical and weary. His dark eyes looked a hundred years old. Bad Jack Boudreaux. The devil in blue jeans. Self-professed cad. Warning her away. He didn't see the paradox, but Laurel did. He was nobody's hero, but he would save her from himself.
She had spent too much of her life with people who claimed to be good and weren't. Jack claimed to be bad, but if he were truly bad, she would have known, would have sensed, wouldn't have wanted him to kiss her, to touch her, to hold her while the night lay warm and fragrant around them.
He's dangerous…
Yes, she had thought that. And if Jack himself wasn't dangerous, then what she felt when he was this near surely was. She couldn't fall for him, not for his body or his tarnished soul or his allure of the forbidden. There was no room in her life for a rogue. She couldn't have her heart broken again; she was still trying to glue the pieces back together from the last time she had come apart.
She could feel it beating, thumping against Jack's chest through the thin fabric of her white T-shirt and his black one. She held her breath and counted the beats, her eyes on his, wondering why she didn't take her own advice and walk away.
"Well, hell," he muttered, pulling her closer, "you don' wanna believe me, I might as well prove it."
The kiss was carnal from the first. Burning hot. Frankly sexual. He traced his tongue slowly around the inner edge of her lips, then slipped deeper, probing, exploring. Laurel tried to catch her breath and caught his instead, hot and flavored with the taste of whiskey.
He ran his hands over her back, chasing shivers, setting off new ones, sliding lower. Desire swelled inside her, pushing aside sanity, blazing a trail for more instinctive responses. She arched against him, losing herself in the kiss, in the moment. She tangled her hands in his hair. His hands slid over her buttocks, kneading, stroking. He caught the hem of her T-shirt and dragged it up, his knuckles skimming over the taut muscles of her back, skating along the sides of her rib cage.
Laurel felt as if she were tumbling through space, dizzy, hanging on tight to her only anchor. Then suddenly she was on her back with no roof but a sky full of diamond lights and branches strung with lacy moss, and Jack was at her breast, his tongue rasping against her nipple, his lips tugging gently. The sensation was incredible, setting off a flutter of something wild inside her, tearing away her self-control-
Control. Panic rose inside her. She never lost control. Couldn't lose control. She was no creature of passion like Savannah.
"No." The word came out as a puff of nothing. She swallowed hard and tried again, pushing at Jack's broad shoulders as guilt and fear and a dozen other emotions twisted in her chest and tightened like vines around her lungs and throat. "Jack, no."
His hand stilled as his fingertips were sneaking under the waistband of her panties. He raised his dark, glittering eyes to meet hers, his mouth poised just above the taut, swollen bud of her nipple. Laurel tightened her every muscle against the desire to just let go. She brought a chilling dose of shame down on her own head to cool the fire.
What the hell was the matter with her, succumbing to the charms of a rake like Jack Boudreaux? On a stone bench in her aunt's courtyard, no less. She barely knew him, didn't trust him, wasn't even sure she liked him.
Jack watched her, watched the flash of panic, the wash of guilt. "You want me, angel. I want you." He shifted his weight, pressing his erection against her hip as proof of his statement.
"I… I don't." Laurel bit down hard on the urge to panic. She kept her eyes locked on his, as if that contact somehow gave her a measure of control. Foolish. He outweighed her by eighty pounds. He could take what he wanted, as men had been doing since the dawn of time.
"Tu menti, mon ange," he murmured, shaking his head. "You lie to yourself, not me."
His eyes held fast on hers as he touched the warm, dewy cleft of her womanhood.
"I think you proved your point," she said bitterly.
"You're a bastard, and I want you anyway. You've made that fact very clear."
That age-old weariness crept into his expression again, seeped outward from some deep, dark well inside him. "Oui," he said. He slid his hand back up over her belly and pulled her T-shirt down, covering her. He smoothed the fabric gently, regretfully, his mouth twisting. "And now I have the whole long night to wonder why I made it at all."
Chapter Thirteen
Laurel checked her reflection in the hall mirror, frowning. She hadn't brought a suit home with her. The best she could do was a loose-fitting navy linen blazer over a white silk tank and a pair of taupe trousers. The outfit was more formal than she had ever planned to look during her stay here, less formal than she would ever have allowed herself on the job. No win.
It seemed she was stuck in a groove of no-win situations. She didn't want to tackle anything more mentally and emotionally taxing than gardening, but had given her pledge to T-Grace and Ovide. She had no intention of getting involved with a man, but had tossed and turned until dawn thinking about Jack, dreaming about Jack. Jack, with his devil's grin. Jack, with his brooding intensity. Jack, with weary dark eyes that had seen too much.
What if she hadn't said no?
"You look very lawyerlike."
Laurel glanced around to find Caroline on her way out for the day. "I don't want to do this," she admitted glumly.
Caroline put her arm around Laurel 's waist to give her a reassuring squeeze. "You don't feel ready?"
"No."
She reached up to tuck an errant strand of ash brown hair behind Laurel 's ear, her heart aching a little. Beneath the discreet makeup, behind the lenses of her oversize spectacles, Laurel had the look of a child braced for the first day of school-trying to be brave, wanting to stay safe at home.
"I think maybe you're more ready than you know, darlin'," Caroline said gently. "More time isn't going to change what happened. You'll never be able to get justice for those children. I think the best thing you can do is go and get justice for somebody else, then."
Laurel heaved a sigh and nibbled her lower lip, chewing off the soft coral lipstick she had just applied. She couldn't think of a thing to say. The feelings were too jumbled. She wanted to stand there forever with Caroline's arm around her, with her aunt's love supporting her. This was what she had come home for, not to jump into trouble with a religious charlatan, not to fend off Vivian's machinations, not to be tempted by Jack Boudreaux. For love, for someone who would judge her far less harshly than she judged herself. For the first time in a long while she felt an acute stab of longing for her father, who had solved all her childish problems with a hug and a kiss and a stick of Juicy Fruit gum. But all she had left of him were a few old snapshots, his crawfish tie pin, and his sister-Caroline.
She drew in a slow, deep breath, tamping down the emotions, drawing up some strength, focusing on the few items scattered on the Chippendale hall table, and cataloging them to give her mind something to do besides wallow in sad memories-an ivory French-style telephone, a blue willow vase holding a spray of fresh-cut flowers, a pewter dish holding an assortment of car keys and a lone earring.
"I'll be all right," she said, her gaze fastening on the earring. It was heart-shaped, large, tarnished silver studded with rhinestones and bits of colored glass. She fished it out of the dish as an excuse to change the topic. "Is this yours?"