Linda Howard Quotes

Over the hum of the appliances, she heard the knocking on the back door. The pain pill must not have knocked Spender out for very long! This time she wouldn't make him stand there and wait. She jumped up, and rushed to unlock the door.
Just her luck. It wasn't Spencer who stood there, but Zeke, scowling at her through the glass. She supposed it was too late to turn around, take a sip of coffee, and head this way again, taking her time.
"Didn't find your key, I see," she said as she opened the door.
"Found it," he said through clenched teeth. "Left it in my room this morning."
"Early-onset Alzheimer's?

He unsnapped her jeans and said, "I want you just like this." Then he kissed her.
There was nothing romantic about Diaz, no murmured sweet things, no gallant gestures, just this kiss that went on and on, deep and voracious. She'd never been kissed like this before, with an intensity that stripped everything down to the simplest components: male, female. He held her with his hand burrowed into her hair, her skull gripped in his palm, her head tilted back while he fed from her mouth. That was what it felt like, a taking. And yet he gave, too. He gave pleasure. She burned with it, the flames fueled by nothing more than his mouth and tongue.

He had destroyed her, so why couldn't she destroy him in return?

I'm Sam Donovan."
"I know who you are. Mrs. Kulavich told me. I'm Jaine Bright."
"I know. She told me. She even told me how you spell your name."
Now, how on earth had Mrs. Kulavich known that?

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Just as he'd done to her, she slowly moved up and down, caressing him with her body, drawing out his response. He ground his teeth together, fighting not to come when she was just as determined he would.
Frustrated, she wondered why he was holding back - until she heard herself moan, and realized the friction was working on her, too.
The battle there in the shower was in close-combat conditions. With the clinging grip of her body she tried to wring a climax from him, locking her legs around him and pumping hard. He slowed her down with that one arm around her hips, grinding her against him and sending her response rocketing.

I don't have casual sex," she said.

He almost smiled. It was merely an expression in those pale eyes, rather than an actual movement of his mouth. "My dear, I promise you there wouldn't be anything casual about it.

I'll need a house key," she said as she followed him into the house.
"Why?"
The question so stupefied her that she stopped in her tracks and stared at him. "So I can get in when you aren't here," she explained as slowly and carefully as if he were just now learning English.
In response he said, "Let me show you something," in almost exactly the same tone she'd used. He pulled the door shut with a bang. "See that round thing? We call it a doorknob, and we use it to open the door. Pay attention, now. See how I put my hand on the doorknob? Turn it to the right, and - " Slowly he demonstrated, and triumphantly thrust the door open. "I'll be damned if the door doesn't open! That's how you get in when I'm not here."
Ohhh, bonus points for both the demonstration and the sarcasm; she knew great smart-ass-ness when she saw it, and this was championship.
"Correction," she cooed. "That's how it used to work. From now on you'll need a key, because I will be locking the door while I'm here alone during the day, and if I go to Battle Ridge for supplies I'll lock the door when I leave. I hope you have two keys, otherwise you'll be knocking on the door to be let into your own house." Then, because she couldn't help herself, she smirked at him.
He crossed his arms and leaned a broad shoulder against the doorframe. His expression hadn't lightened, but a glint in those green eyes suddenly gave her the impression he was almost enjoying himself.

Think of it as therapy," he encouraged. "A sort of repayment for your own therapeutic knowledge. You gave me a reason to live, and I'll show you how to live.

Luca had many strengths and powers; as a rare blood born, conceived and born to a vampire mother and father, he was much stronger than those who'd been turned to the life.

I'm really not hungry," she repeated, lifting the coffee cup and inhaling the fragrant steam before sipping.
"Just a few bites," he cajoled, taking his own place beside her. "You need to keep up your strength for tonight."
She gave him a heated, slumberous look, remembering her fantasy. "Why? Are you planning something special?"
"I suppose I am," he said consideringly. "It's special every time we make love.

Okay, you're right; she's so hot I could walk on three legs every time I see her."
"Now you're talkin'."
"I'll break your back and chop off your legs if you call her."
"That's my boy!

Is it time for your period, or something?"
With unerring instinct, he'd found a great big red button, and pushed it. Wyatt fights to win, which means he fights dirty. I understand the concept because that's how I fight, too, but understanding it didn't stop me from reacting. I could practically feel my blood bubbling with steam. "What?"
He turned around, all controlled aggression, and damned if he didn't push the button again. "What is it about having a period that makes women so bitchy?"
... It was an effort, but I said as sweetly as possible, "It isn't that we're bitchier, it's that having a period makes us feel all tired and achy, so we have less tolerance for all the bullshit we normally SUFFER IN SILENCE." By the time the sentence ended the sweetness was long gone, my jaw was clenched, and I think my eyes were bugging out.
Wyatt took a step back, belatedly looking alarmed.

You look like you're about to puke," he observed, pushing his cart forward.
With a quick, inner shake she gathered herself and cut him off to take her rightful position as lead cart. "I was trying to imagine you as a kid. It was horrifying.

XEROX AND WURLITZER HAVE ANNOUNCED THEY
WILL MERGE TO MARKET REPRODUCTIVE ORGANS

He lifted the arm covering his eyes and turned his head to glare at her. "I knew you were trouble the first time I saw you."
"What do you mean, trouble?" She sat up, glaring back at him. "I am not trouble! I'm a very nice person except when I have to deal with jerks!"
"You're the worst kind of trouble," he snapped. "You're marrying trouble.

It was amazing how flowers could grow in the damnedest places, but the Devlin weed patch had sprouted quite a wildflower in Faith.

God, I love you," he said, and laid his head on her belly, his arms locked around her hips.
Madelyn slid her fingers into his hair.
"It took you long enough," she said gently.
"What I lack in quickness, I make up in staying power."
"Meaning?"
"That I'll still be telling you that fifty years from now." He paused and turned his head to
kiss her stomach.

REQUIRED TO TAKE A COMBINATION OF GINKGO AND VIAGRA, SO YOU CAN REMEMBER WHAT THE FUCK YOU'RE DOING.

She knew better than to lose her head over a man. That was what was so humiliating: she knew better. Three broken engagements had taught her that a woman needed to keep her wits about her when dealing with the male species, or she could get seriously hurt.

He lifted her hand to his mouth. The touch of his lips was soft on her scraped palm, the tiny licks of his tongue so light she could barely feel them. Wait. He was licking her?
"You can't lick me," she said sternly. "i don't know your name."
He looked up and a quick grin slashed across his face. "Luca," he said....
"Luca," she repeated. "Is that an America name?"
"No." He lifted her hand to his mouth again, and his tongue once more began a slow, gentle movement over the scrape. She was okay with it now, because she knew his name.

She hadn't been broken; she'd been furious and hurt, but never broken...

She had learned never to look back, never to give fate a second chance to kick her in the teeth.

Oh, is that what's in the box? You threw my engagement ring at me?

Just how many pairs of black shoes do you need?" he finally asked, staring at them lined up on the floor. Okay, shoes aren't a laughing matter. I gave him a cool stare. "One pair more than I have." "Then why didn't you get them?" "Because I would still need one pair more than I have.

Nice is good. It doesn't sound exciting, but think about it. I think Mr. Perfect would be kind to kids and animals, help old ladies across the street, not insult you when your opinion is different from his. Being nice is so important it's close to being number one.

If death turned out to be a lack of being rather than a lack of consciousness, well, then, that sucked.

Calmly, deliberately, he moved his hands down to her breasts and molded his fingers over them. Jay inhaled sharply, and he said, "Easy, easy," as he stroked the soft mounds.
"Steve, no." But her eyes were closing as warm pleasure built in her, her blood beating slowly and powerfully through her veins. His thumbs rubbed over her nipples and she quivered, her breasts beginning to tighten.
"You're so soft." His voice roughened even more. "God, how I've wanted to touch you. Come here, sweetheart.

Everything feels like the end of the world, and you can't reason with someone who can't see tomorrow.

He's thought he was willing to do anything in order to get what he wanted, what was right for his kind. He'd been certain any sacrifice was possible.
He'd been wrong.

How do you function when your entire body has been overtaken by searing emotional pain? How do you function when a huge hole had been ripped in your life? How do you ever smile again, laugh again, feel joy again?
You just do it...Because you have no choice.

She was holding her breath, waiting to start living.

C'mon! Anything over eight inches is strictly for show-and-tell. It's there, but you can't use it. It might look good in a locker room, but let's face it - those extra two inches are leftovers." "Leftovers," Luna gasped, holding her stomach and shrieking with laughter. "Let's hear it for l-leftovers!

You found a pen?" "No, but I have a can of Cheez Whiz. I'll write your number on the counter with it, then find a pen and copy it.

The bad thing about living in a small town was that everything became a personal issue. The good thing about living in a small town was that everything became a personal issue. During times of trouble, the support system was massive.

Don't you want it?"
"Want what?"
"The engagement ring."
"Oh, is that what's in the box? You threw my engagement ring at me?" Boy, this was such a big transgression I would have to write it in block letters on its own page, and show it to our children when they grew up as an example of how not to do something.

"Want what?"
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This life wasn't all there was; there was more, much more, and when people spoke of death as "passing" they were exactly right, because the spirit passed on to that other level of existence. Knowing that was the most comforting thing she could imagine.

Maybe her current state was the simple matter of her biological clock kicking into gear, and Zeke just happened to be the closest appropriate male. She'd read about the biology of attraction, analyzed it. Men liked women with big breasts because that meant they could feed all the babies. Women, on a cellular level, went for a man who could take care of the saber-tooth tiger that was trying to get into their cave. When it came to simple genetics, Zeke was rather caveman like. He hadn't yet grunted at her, but she was certain he would, sooner or later.

You're a demon, you know that?" he said with feeling. "When your feet hit the floor every morning, I'll bet the devil shudders and says 'Oh shit, she's awake'" Cael to Jenner

Sign by elevator put up by computer geeks in office building: REMEMBER: FIRST YOU PILAGE, THEN YOU BURN. THOSE WHO DO NOT COMPLY WILL BE SUSPENDED FROM THE RAIDING TEAM. In Mr Perfect

Why is it when a man gets mad, he's aaangry, but when a woman gets mad, it's just a tantrum? She paused, struck by what he'd said.

He sat with his arm still around her, watching her face and smiling as she fumbled with the elegant gold wrapping, her agile fingers suddenly clumsy. She lifted the lid off and stared speechlessly at the simple pendant that lay on satin lining like a cobweb of gold. A dark red heart, chiseled and planed, was attached to the chain.
"That's a ruby," she stammered.
"No," he corrected gently, lifting it from the box and placing it around her neck. "That's my heart." The chain was long, and the ruby heart slid down her chest to nestle between her breasts, gleaming with dark fire as it lay against her honeyed skin.
"Wear that forever," he murmured his eyes on the lush curves that his gift used as a pillow.
"And my heart will always be touching yours.

No matter how much damage he had done, he hadn't won.

If your hero is a firefighter, your heroine better be an arsonist.

I read somewhere that flying is like throwing your soul into the heavens and racing to catch it as it falls."
"I don't think mine would ever fall," he murmured, looking at the clear cold sky.

Before you know it, you'll be smiling at her across the breakfast table."
"I don't smile," Cahill said, though he was having to fight his amusement.
"So you'll be scowling at her across the breakfast table. That isn't my point.

Plans?" he snorted. "I'm ninety-three years old! Who in tarnation makes plans at my age? I could stop breathin' any minute now.

Love by itself isn't enough; it's never enough. There had to be other things, such as liking and respect, or love would get worn away by the realities of everyday life.

Hurry," Hector urged, and his voice changed as his power surged, his tone and cadence sliding into the rhythm that said he was seeing the future. "Battle is in the air. I smell it. I can almost touch it. Death is coming Death is coming for us." With a click, the call disconnected.

I'm not good at games, Robert. Don't kiss me unless it's for read. Don't come around unless you mean to stay."

"Do you mean marriage?" he asked coolly, his expressive eyebrows lifting.

..."if you're looking for a summer affair, I'm not your woman."

His mouth twisted as an unreadable expression crossed his face. "Oh, but you are. You just haven't admitted it to yourself yet.

I'll be on another case soon. You won't need me anymore. You'll be walking, though I think you should wait a while before climbing another mountain."

"You're my therapist," Blake snapped.

Dione gave a little laugh. "For months you've depended on me more than any other person in your life. Your perspective is distorted now.
Believe me, by the time I've been gone a month, you won't even think about me."

'Do you mean you'd just turn your back on me and walk away?" he asked disbelievingly.

As the morning wore on, she was grateful

Milla put her hands on his ribs, holding on as he braced his weight on one arm while with his other hand he guided his penis to her and in the same rough motion pushed deep inside.
He froze in place, his breath panting between his parted lips as they stared at each other. She couldn't move; the feel of him inside her was too sharp, almost painful in its intensity. Their gazes met in the mellow lamplight, and she was mesmerized by the tension in his face, the way his steely muscles were locked as if he didn't dare move. It built and built, that clawing need, and yet she remained poised on the razor's edge of something she knew she couldn't control. His chest suddenly heaved on a convulsive breath, and he moved in a long, deep stroke that took him all the way to the hilt.

His face was terrifying in its stillness, with only his eyes alive, glittering with rage. She could feel the force of his anger in the coiled strength of his body, hear it in the almost inaudible softness of his tone. He wasn't a man who lost control in his anger; he gained it to an even greater degree.

Her eyes were raw, burning with the hell inside her.

The old ladies were dressing up, she thought; the clouds draped around the mountains' shoulders like a dirty boa, with the snowcaps jutting above and the broad green bases below.

[ ... ] You didn't think I'd let the backstabbing little hussy get away with it, did you? Not that I don't love Jenni, but she's the baby of the family, and she thinks she should get anything and everything she wants. Occasionally she has to be shown differently.

The door creaked as it began to open.
Gray moved like lightning, slapping his left palm against the door and slamming it shut before it had
opened more than a fraction of an inch. "Hey!" a woman squawked indignantly from the other side.
"This one's occupied," he said hoarsely, not missing a beat with his plunging hips. "Go somewhere else."
Faith couldn't say anything. Her eyes widened with alarm, but all she could do was look helplessly up at
him.
Gray's lips drew back over his teeth and his head dropped forward as he began hammering faster. His
face was flushed, satisfaction only a few moments away.
Faith shuddered wildly as the coil of tension suddenly released and the fierce, pulsing flood of sensation
swept through her. Shivering and pushing hard against him, she buried her face against his chest and bit
his shirt to muffle her gasping cries.
He kept his hand flat against the door, gripping her bottom with his right hand to anchor himself. He
shoved hard into her, twice, three times, again, then bucked violently. His head fell back and a harsh,
guttural cry rumbled up from his chest.
There was an insistent banging on the door. "What are you doing in there?" the woman said in shrill,
grating tones. "That's the lady's room! You aren't supposed to be in there!"
Slowly Gray's head came up. The expression in his eyes was indescribable, as if he couldn't believe
what was happening. He took a de

She had always enjoyed her sense of being alone, envisioning herself as a ball that rolled through life, bumping into other lives but not stopping.

Chloe put aside worries about her job, her life, and turned to face him. "Sex can't be the answer to everything," she said as she draped her arms around his strong neck.
He bent his head to hers. "For now, it can," he said and kissed her.

She felt both relaxed and protected with him, at least from outside forces. Nothing, it seemed, could protect her from him, and tonight she wasn't even certain she wanted to be. Claimed, and mated. She was his, but was he hers? And if he was, what in hell did they do about it?
"I don't even know what you want," she said fretfully, beginning to lose herself in rising sensation.
"This," he muttered in a dark, rough tone. "You.
Everything.

Jina Matthews, who worked at the cubicle directly beside Carlin's, wasn't having a good way, either. She was on her phone, her expression tense. She and her boyfriend had been fighting a lot lately, and it looked as if Jina was at the end of her rope. She said a few choice words, then thumbed a button on her phone. Looking across the aisle at Carlin, she made a wry face.
"It was so much more satisfying when you could slam a phone down. Pushing a button just doesn't have the same gratification factor." Her phone, set to vibrate, buzzed around on the desk as another call came in. Jina picked it up, looked at the caller ID, and jabbed the button again. "Unless it's the off button." She leaned forward and spoke to the silent phone. "Call all you want, jackass. I can't hear you," she said in a singsong falsetto.

His mouth was hot and hungry, and he kissed the way no man should kiss and still be allowed to run free.

The lessons learned hardest were the lessons learned best.

What are you doing?" she cried in protest.
"Playing," he said, the single word rough, almost guttural.

excitement of it. He'd been the golden boy,

Sudden, hell. I've been hard for two months.

I told you, we haven't had sex! It was just a kiss. Like the Viper was just a car, and Mount
Everest was just a hill.

You were happy last night. This morning is a different story."

"You think I have a hangover. I don't. Well a little headache, but not much. Just let this be a warning to you if you keep me from sleeping again tonight."

"I kept you from sleeping? I kept you from sleeping?" he repeated incredulously. "You are the same woman who shook me out of a sound sleep at two a.m. yesterday morning, aren't you?"

"I didn't shake you. I kind of bounced on you, but I didn't shake you."

"Bounced," he repeated.

"You had a hard-on. I couldn't let it go to waste, could I?"

"You could have woke me up before you started not to let it go to waste."

"Look," she said exasperated, "If you don't want used, don't lie on your back with it sticking up like that. If that isn't an invitation, I don't know what is."

"I was asleep. It does that on its own." It was doing it on its own right know, as a matter of fact. It poked her in the stomach.

She looked down... and smiled. It was a smile that made his testicles draw up in fear.

With a sniff, she turned her back on him and ignored him as she finished showering.

"Hey!" he said, to get her attention. Alarm was in his tone. "You aren't going to let this one go to waste are you?

...hurting was better than dying.

She had no sense of time, of what day it was, or anything beyond the bed she was on and the unceasing battle she fought with the Great Bitch of Pain.
The nurses talked to her, too, explaining over and over what had happened to her, what they were doing, why they were doing it. She didn‟t care, so long as they delivered the drugs that kept the Great Bitch at bay. Of course, there came a time - way too soon, by her way of thinking - when her surgeon ordered a decrease in the drugs. He wasn‟t the one in agony, with his sternum cut in two, so what did he care? He was the one wielding the saw and scalpel, not the one on the receiving end. She had only a vague idea which of her visitors was the surgeon, but as her mind began clearing she memorized some particularly salty things she wanted to say to him. Okay, so he'd had to cut her sternum in half, but cutting her drugs in half? Bastard.

When we're married and he looks at me sitting beside him at the table, he should feel as if he's fought a great battle and accomplished something - namely, winning me. He'll treasure me more. I like being treasured.

I'm calling the police," she said, showing him the phone in her hand.
He smiled, and for a moment she forgot about the phone. "You don't need the police."
No, of course she didn't How silly.

You remember the 'be quiet' part of the rules? Embrace it.

You have underwear."
"I'm glad you enjoyed it. Did you try it on?"
"Nah. Just rubbed it against my face.

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Do you want romantic? I can try. I'm more of a see-it, want-it, go-for-it type of guy, and I did: see you, want you, go for you. Her

There was no going back...because some roads you just couldn't travel again.

In the rest room next door there was a long, explosive sound of gas releasing, then a contented 'Ahhh.' Grace clapped a hand over her mouth to hold back the hysterical giggle that rose in her throat. She had to finish before he did, or he might hear her. The competition was the strangest in which she'd ever engaged.

I'm going to go," he said.
"All right."
He didn't move. Then: "I don't want to."
"Do it anyway."
He chuckled. "You're a hard woman, Faith Devlin."
"Hardy."
"I didn't know him. He isn't real to me. Did you love him?"
"Yes." But not the way I love you. Never like that.

He was silent a moment; then he said, "I want a drink of water."
She almost laughed aloud, because it was such a mundane request that could have been made of anyone, but then she saw the tension in his jaw and lips and realized that, again, he was checking out his condition, and he wanted her with him. She turned to the small Styrofoam pitcher that was kept full of crushed ice, which she used to keep his lips moist. The ice had melted enough that she was able to pour the glass half full of water. She stuck a straw into it and held it to his lips.
Gingerly he sucked the liquid into his mouth and held it for a moment, as if letting it soak into his membranes. Then, slowly, he swallowed, and after a minute he relaxed. "Thank God," he muttered hoarsely. "My throat still feel swollen. I wasn't sure I could swallow, and I sure as hell didn't want that damned tube back."
Behind Jay, Frank turned a smothered laugh into a cough.
"Anything else?" she asked.
"Yes. Kiss me.

Don't kiss me," she said warningly.
"I don't intend to," he replied, smiling a little. "I don't have my whip and chair with me.

A thousand thoughts ran through my mind. Well, at least six or seven, anyway, because a thousand thoughts are a lot. Try counting your own thoughts and see how long it takes you to get to a thousand.

I have a blanket behind the seat, a thick wool one. We can cuddle on the bleachers, and with the blanket wrapped around us no one will know if I sneak a feel every now and then."
"I'll know."
"God, I hope so. If you don't, then I've either lost my touch or my aim.

It's daylight. Shouldn't you have burned to a crisp, or something? Don't you have to crawl into a coffin? Where do you keep it stashed, anyway?"
"I've never owned a coffin," he admitted, unable to hold back a smile.

Minor detail. I'm going to kiss you, Marlie - "
"I'll bite you again," she swiftly warned.
He shrugged. "I always have had more guts than sense," he said, and very gently brushed her mouth with
his.

What?" he demanded testily.
Trammell raised his eyebrows. "I didn't say anything."
"You're thinking something, though. You've got that shit-eating smirk on your face."
"Why would anyone smirk while they eat shit?" Trammell asked rhetorically.

Trammell raised" title="Linda Howard Quotes: What?" he demanded testily.
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He was different from every other man she knew. He was capable of loving; he was at once a laughing daredevil and a hard-hitting businessman. But most of all, he needed her. Other patients had needed her, but only as a therapist. Blake needed her, the woman she was, because only her personal strengths had enabled her to help him with her trained skills and knowledge. She couldn't remember anyone ever needing her before.

Her lips parted slightly in a smile so female it took his breath away, and her deep blue eyes beckoned him, dared him. Once again her hips lifted. "What are you waiting for?" she breathed.
"For you," he answered, and even as he lost himself in the mindless ecstasy of making love to her, the truth of that remained. He'd waited for her forever.

By morning, she was raw and sore, and knew walking would be an effort. By morning, she could barely remember what it had been like to not know his body, not to have felt him inside her and held him in her arms and absorbed the power of his thrusts as he came.
By morning, she was his.

Do you want me?" she whispered, licking him again. She felt very warm, and slightly drunk with her feminine power. Desire was unfurling inside her, opening like a flower. Her breasts throbbed, and she rubbed them against his leg.

He gave a strangled laugh, almost undone by her natural sensuality. "Look a few inches to your right and tell me what you think.

She whimpered softly into his mouth. "We can't," she cried, desperation and desire tearing her apart.
"The hell we can't," he rasped, taking her hand and moving it down his body to where his flesh strained at the fabric of his pants. Her fingers jerked at the contact: then a spasm of pain crossed her pale face, and her hand lingered involuntarily, exploring the dimensions of his arousal. He caught his breath. "Jay, baby, don't' stop me now!

Well, you've done it now," was her sisterly
opening shot.
Jaine rubbed between her eyebrows; a definite headache was forming. After the exchange with
David, she waited to see where this one was going.
"I won't be able to hold up my head in church."
"Really? Oh, Shelley, I'm so sorry," Jaine said sweetly. "I didn't realize you have the dreaded
Limp Neck disease. When were you diagnosed?

You should've come with me. Had fun, lots of fun." The last sentence was deep with sensuality. "You don't know what you're missin', Faithie."

"Then I don't miss it, do I?" Faith whispered, and Jodie giggled.

And if you do anything to hurt my mom's cat, I'll take you apart cell by cell. I'll mutilate your DNA so it can never reproduce, which would probably be a good thing for the world.

Pleasure was a siren, luring her to experience more

So it isn't that the act is awful, but sometimes the man is."
"Exactly. One's modesty is useless and it's painfully intimate, but not awful." She took a deep breath.
"The opposite, in fact.

She didn't want to handle him. She didn't want anything to do with him - this man with his cold, intense eyes and clipped speech, this stranger, this Yankee. He made her feel like a rabbit facing a cobra: terrified, but fascinated at the same time. He tried to hide his ruthlessness behind smooth, cosmopolitan manners, but Evie had no doubts about the real nature of the man.

He wanted her. He intended to have her. And he wouldn't care if he destroyed her in the taking.

amusement in her eyes and had to grin.
"How are you feeling?" he asked, his voice dropping to a low, intimate tone that excluded everyone else in the cafe and made several women draw in their
breath.

Her mouth quirked in that self-amusement that made him want to grab her to him.

"This isn't one of my good days. The only thing holding me together is static cling."

"Come home with me, and I'll take care of you."
She looked him in the eye and said quietly, "Give me one good reason why I should."

Right there in front of God and most of Crook, Montana, he drew in a deep breath and took the gamble of a lifetime, his words plain and heard by all, because no one was making even the pretense of not listening.

"Because I love you."

Maddie blinked, and to his surprise he saw her eyes glitter with tears. Before he could start forward, however, her smile broke through like sunshine through a cloud bank. She didn't take the time to go around the counter; she climbed on top of it and slid off on the other side.

"It's about time," she said as she went into his arms.

Unfortunately, what should or should not be had no relation to what was.

You see?" he asked, his voice softening to a velvety punas he felt her tremble. His warm breath stirred her hair. "All I have to do is touch you. It's the same for me, Faith. I don't like this worth a damn, but by God, I want you, and we're going to do something about it.

Cows are the Devil's handmaidens.