White Lies by Linda Howard Page B

the rhythm of his breathing slowed, and he muttered, "I'm
tired."
                  "You've pushed yourself too far. It's
only been three weeks, you know."
                  "Jay."
                  "What?"
                  "Stay with me."
                  "I will. You know I will."
                  "It's... strange. I can't even picture
your face in my mind, but part of me knows you. Maybe biblical knowledge goes
deeper than mere memory." His harsh voice gave rough edges to the words,
but Jay felt as if an electrical charge had hit her body, making her skin tingle.
Her mind filled with images, but not those of memory; her imagination
manufactured new ones—of this man with his harder soul and ruined voice,
bending over her, taking her in his arms, moving between her legs in a more
complete possession than she had ever known before. Her own breath shortened as
her breasts grew tight and achy, and her insides turned liquid. Another tingle
jolted her, making her feel as if she were on the verge of physical ecstasy,
and merely from his words, his voice. The violence of her response shocked her,
scared her, and she jerked away from his bed before she could control the
motion.
                  "Jay?" He was concerned, even a
little alarmed, as he felt her move away from him.
                  "Go to sleep," she managed to say,
her voice almost under control. "You need the rest. I'll be here when you
wake up."
                  He lifted his bandaged hand. "How about
holding my hand?"
                  "I can't do that. It would hurt
you."
                  "It would blend in with all the other
pain," he said groggily. He was losing strength rapidly. "Just touch
me until I go to sleep, all right?" Jay felt his request go straight
through her heart. That he should ask anything of her still staggered her, but
his need to be touched was almost more than she could bear. She stepped back to
the bed, folding her hand over his arm. At the first touch she felt him begin
to relax, and within two minutes he was asleep.
                  She stepped outside, feeling the need to
escape, though she wasn't certain exactly what she was escaping from. It was
Steve, and yet it was something else, something inside her that was growing
more and more powerful. It scared her; she didn't want it, yet she was helpless
to stop it. She had never responded to him like that before, not even in the
first wild, heady days of their marriage. It's just the situation, she told
herself, trying to find comfort in the thought. It was just her tendency to
throw herself wholly into something, concentrating on it too intensely, that
made her feel like this. But comfort eluded her and despair welled in her
heart, because analyzing her emotions didn't change them. God help her, she was
falling in love with him again, with even less reason than she'd had the first
time. For most of the past three weeks he'd been little more than a mummy,
incapable of movement or speech, yet she had felt drawn to him, tied to him;
and loving him now was much more dangerous than it had been before. He was a
different, stronger, harder man. Even when he'd been unconscious, she had felt
his fierce inner power, and her need to know what had happened to him to cause
that change was so strong it almost hurt.
                  A nurse, the one who had first noticed Steve's
unconscious reaction to Jay's presence, stopped beside her. "How is he? He
refused his pain medication this morning."
                  "He's asleep now. He tires very
easily."
                  The nurse nodded, her bright blue eyes meeting
Jay's darker ones. "He has the most incredible constitution I've ever
seen. He's still in a great deal of pain, but he just seems to ignore it.
Normally it would be at least another week before we began tapering off the
pain medication." Admiration