"We're… we're sitting… on the floor!" she explained raggedly, still half choking with her laughter. "It's so funny!"
His hands tightened on her arms. "Funny?" he repeated. "Funny! Are you laughing?"
She nodded her head furiously against his chest, too limp to even straighten up.
"Funny!" he said again, incredulously, sending her into another fit. Instinctively, he pulled her closer to allow her laughter to spill over his bare chest. The sensation was fantastic, much the same as receiving a refreshing rain shower on a sultry day. He smiled in the dark as her small body quivered against his. He had never heard such a wondrously joyful sound. His own smile began to twitch.
Felicity felt his laughter before she heard it. The silent quaking shook her and then the sound came pouring out like a jubilant geyser to splash over her.
Josh sank backward onto the pillows, carrying his wife with him, clinging to her until the last rumbles of their mirth died away and they lay together, weakly gasping for breath.
After a long time, he spoke. "What do you think we should do now?" he asked a little breathlessly.
"Do?" Felicity repeated stupidly, too drained to even figure out what he was talking about.
"Yes, do. About our bed."
Felicity found this cryptic remark entirely beyond her depleted ability to analyze. "Huh?" she asked, lifting her head attentively.
He sighed with exaggerated patience. "Our bed is broken. Remember?" he said slowly. "I could, of course, carry you off to one of the other bedrooms, but I'm not exactly dressed for a move."
The word "dressed" lodged in her mind. What did he mean, he wasn't dressed? Suddenly she realized that the fuzz beneath her cheek had been hair. And naked flesh. Tentatively, she moved the arm draped across his waist. Her fingers grazed bare skin.
"You aren't wearing any clothes!" she squeaked, jerking her hand away. She would have jerked the rest of herself away, too, but he was holding her too tightly.
"No, and you're wearing too many," he said, running his hand up and down her back, testing the warmth of her through the thin fabric. The desire that the fall had quenched proved only to be banked. It now flickered to life again, but the raw edge of his need was gone, replaced by a languorous sensuality. His other hand reached for her face and drew it down to his.
Had he tried to force her, she might have resisted once more, but this time his touch was light, almost teasing. When her lips grazed his, all thoughts of resistance vanished.
"Mmmm, you taste so good," he murmured against her mouth as he nibbled at her bottom lip.
And he did, too, she realized. The whiskey flavor was no longer offensive, but intoxicating. Unconsciously, she lifted her hand to his face and slipped her fingers into the soft silver of his hair to deepen the kiss.
His moan of response emboldened her, and when he shifted her to lie on top of him, she cooperated gladly. His tongue was doing such marvelous things inside her mouth that she barely noticed the way his hands had rearranged her nightdress until one of them cupped her bare bottom. Her breath caught in her throat as a thousand sensations rippled through her, every one of them deliciously pleasant.
He moaned again, coaxing her until her legs parted and she was straddling him. She felt the heat of him, and sensed the strength beneath her, strength willingly restrained. Testing her own power, she tightened the grip of her knees against his flanks and playfully nuzzled her hips to his. He made a strangled sound down in his throat and retaliated by clutching at her thighs. His rough fingers mercilessly teased the sensitive inner flesh until her hips bucked against his out of need. And all the time his mouth continued to play with hers, tasting and probing and nipping, until she thought she might well drown in the wonder of it.
Then the whole world turned upside down, and he was looming over her, a faceless silhouette in the darkness. "I'm going to take your nightdress off," he whispered raggedly.
"Are you?" she asked faintly, vaguely aware that he was already working at the buttons.
He did not bother to reply. In a few more moments, the garment slipped over her head, leaving her naked and aching with need. Grateful for the darkness that hid her body, she was equally grateful that it hid her face. Surely her love for him must show in her eyes. It heated her blood until she feared her very skin might glow.
Knowing that her secret was safely hidden, she reached for him hungrily. He came to her, but it was he who devoured. His fevered kisses rained over her body, exploring every inch of her. When she was a quivering mass of desire, he leaned down to taste of that desire.
The shock of his touch shook her, and she cried out with the force of her pleasure. He lifted her higher and higher until she knew she could not stand another moment.
"Please!" she begged.
"Please, what?" he teased, his breath a scorching torment against her throbbing flesh.
"Please!" she repeated, not knowing the words to ask for what she wanted.
But he understood. Slowly, torturously, he stroked his way up her body. Her hands clutched at him in a silent entreaty to hurry, but he took his time. When his face was over hers, she felt the gentle nudging below. Her hands grasped his hips to urge him on, but he held back.
Josh stared down at her, trying futilely to see her face. His own control was dangling by a single thread of willpower, but he needed one thing from her first. "My name. Say my name," he rasped.
"Please!" she almost sobbed. "Please, Joshua."
He filled her in one swift thrust, but even that was not enough for her. She wrapped her legs around him in an effort to draw him even closer, into her heart. Into her soul.
This time there were no colored lights, only a blinding flash of brilliance that seemed to consume them both in a white-hot flame. Felicity fell into a contented sleep in the afterglow.
Candace hummed softly as she made her way to her tiny cabin behind the main house. The last of the guests had gone, so she no longer needed to stand guard over the master bedroom. She smiled again over the memory of her own reaction to the loud thump she had heard from that room earlier. Rushing to listen at the door, she had caught Mr. Josh's outraged."Somebody cut the ropes!" That, she realized, would explain why the Delano woman had been looking for a sharp knife earlier in the day.
Remembering the sounds of laughter she had heard next from the bedroom made her chuckle. She was still chuckling when she entered her cabin. The single room was pitch-dark, but Candace moved with the confidence of familiarity over to where a lamp rested on a table in the center of the small room. Feeling for a match, she struck it and lighted the lamp.
"Hello," a masculine voice said from the shadows behind her.
Candace cried out in alarm, the lamp chimney slipping from her startled fingers. It smashed onto the floor as she whirled to face the voice.
The man stepped into the circle of light. An evil smile twisted his coffee-colored face, and his brown eyes glittered ominously.
Candace looked up at that face. "Who are you?" she asked with false bravado, one dark hand pressed to her clamoring heart.
The man stepped closer, making Candace aware of how huge he was, how powerful. And how dangerous. "Don't you know me, Mama?" he asked, tilting his head as if such a possibility were inconceivable.
Candace stared at him. The flickering lamp cast eerie shadows over the room, increasing her sense of unreality while she studied the stranger's face, a face that was as familiar as her own. "Jeremiah," she whispered, not wanting to believe it but knowing she was right all the same. Jeremiah. Her Jeremiah. But not at all the way she remembered him.
"Ah, so you do remember me," he said, taking another step toward her. Instinctively, she backed away until she bumped the table. Her hands clutched convulsively against its edge. "I thought maybe you'd forgotten that you even had a son," he added, his voice tinged with sarcasm.