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He was appalled when his anger spiked, overriding everything in him that was reasonable. He took the slenderness of her shoulder in his hand, and spun her around, and without fully registering the shock on her face, he pulled her hard into him, and kissed her.
It was not a hello kind of kiss.
It was a punishing kiss. Savage. It held the bitter sting of love betrayed, the hurt of five years of asking why. And it held the power of a man who been severely wounded on the battlefield of love, but who had survived, and let those festering wounds make him stronger, harder, colder than he ever had been before.
She was shoving against him, frantically, trying to escape his hold, his lips. He felt momentary satisfaction that her strength was so puny compared to his.
But then it registered, somewhere, peripherally, that something was wrong. Elana trying to escape his lips? She would have delighted in the savagery. She would have given back as good as she got. She probably would have drawn blood by now.
As he was arriving at these conclusions, he felt the woman surrender beneath the punishing onslaught of his lips. The struggle stopped.
He was contemplating this development, letting the doubt take hold where certainty had been, when she yanked free of him, and belted him up the side of his head with a purse that felt like it had a brick in it.
He staggered back from her and regarded her with narrowed eyes.
He felt as if he’d been hit with more than a brick as he studied the exquisite face that looked back at him.
“How dare you!” she sputtered angrily, glaring at him, and then began wiping away at the front of her blouse, which was wet from his shower-damp skin, as if she could erase his touch from herself.
Oh, it was Elana’s face, all right. Heart-shaped, exquisitely feminine, vaguely exotic. How well he remembered those lines—the incredible cheekbones, the pert nose, the faintly pointed chin.
But the how dare you in that clipped, tight tone was not Elana. The woman in front of him simply was not Elana.
Underneath the sooty sweep of thick lashes, he realized the eyes were a shade different. Elana’s had been blue. These eyes were indigo, like the center of a violet-colored pansy.
Of course, with contact lenses, anything could happen, and he studied the woman more intently.
The anger and fear in her lovely eyes were real. And right behind them was softness. The same softness he had felt in those lips.
Not, on closer study, Elana’s mouth either. Hers had been wide and sensual. This woman’s mouth was small, her lips little bows, puffy from being so thoroughly kissed.
He swore under his breath. He’d just kissed the living daylights out of a perfect stranger who had the bad luck to show up as he was remembering that he had once sung a love song. He crossed his arms over his naked chest.
It was obvious to him that she didn’t like that he was only wearing a towel. She didn’t like it one little bit. She was studying her blouse as though she expected daffodils to bloom from the bosom.
“You’ve ruined my blouse,” she said, finally, her voice stiff with control. “It’s silk.”
“Yeah. I figured.”
She gave him a look that said she didn’t think he would know the first thing about silk, so of course he felt prodded to deepen the great first impression he’d made.
“Silk is always see-through when it’s wet,” he said easily.
Her eyes grew very round. Her mouth formed an indignant O. She blushed, and crossed her arms over her breasts, snap, snap, like it was a military maneuver. By-the-numbers, cover chest.
“Too late,” he said. “I saw it. Lace trim.”
“Oh!” she said.
“Don’t hit me with that purse again,” he warned her.
“Well, then quit looking at me like that!”
“Like what?”
She sputtered, “Like…like a complete lizard.”
J. D. Turner, avowed bachelor, still enjoyed the fact that his charms could turn heads and make hearts beat faster. A lizard? He could hardly believe his ears. He was tempted to kiss her again, even if it did earn him another wallop with the purse.
He studied her more closely.
Well, no wonder she was showing immunity to his charms. Her close physical resemblance to Elana had made him assume she was like Elana.
But a closer inspection showed she wasn’t.
That blouse was buttoned right up to her throat. Her hair had been forced into a tight no-nonsense bun. Her makeup was understated. Her lips were pursed into an expression of disapproval that was distinctly schoolmarmish.
“What can I do for you?” he asked, curtly. She might not be Elana, but she was of Elana. A relative. Maybe a twin sister. No, a younger sister. But whoever she was, nothing about Elana was going to be good news. He felt that right down to his gut.
She released an arm from where it guarded her wet breast, and swiped at her lips as if removing germs from them. Her arm returned immediately to its guard position. Then she looked around, and he saw it register in her eyes that she was on the front porch of a strange house with a near-naked man who had just kissed her, and the nearest neighbor was not within shouting distance.
Under different circumstances, he most certainly would have tried to reassure her. But Elana meant danger.
Even if this woman in front of him looked like the least dangerous person in the world, he had tasted her lips. There was something in that kiss that was not nearly as cool as she was purporting to be.
Her hair, the color of ripening wheat, piled up primly, still framed a face so beautiful she could be mistaken for an angel. Of course, Elana could have been mistaken for an angel, too.
He saw now his visitor was slender. Elana had been slender, too, but somehow voluptuous at the same time. And Elana had liked the sexy look, miniskirts, black leather. His present visitor’s tailored suit reinforced that impression of a schoolmarm. The pastel blue reminded him of something his dental hygienist wore. The whole package screamed “prim and proper,” Mary Poppins arriving at her assignment.
Elana had not been prim and proper. Still, the danger crackled in the air around this less vivacious copy.
“What can I do for you?” he repeated, his voice deliberately cold.
“Nothing,” she decided. “I’ve made a mistake.” She took a shaky step backwards, and then turned to flee.
He didn’t honestly know whether he felt regret or relief that the mystery of his visitor was going to go unsolved.
He supposed he was leaning a bit toward regret, since he had to bite back the “wait” that wanted to pop out of his mouth.
In her haste to get away from him, she stumbled on the second stair. Instinct made him reach for her, but it was too late. She went flying; he could hear the dull thud of her head hitting the cement pad at the bottom of the steps.
He was at her side in an instant, animosity forgotten.
She looked at him, dazed. “Don’t touch me,” she ordered groggily.
Her forehead was cut, a lump growing around the cut at an alarming speed.
“Don’t touch me,” she ordered again, as he picked her up. She was so light, it didn’t strain his hurt shoulder to lift her. Her weight was unexpectedly warm and sweet in his arms.
“Put me down,” she demanded, then had to close her eyes, the effort of making that small demand too much for her.
He ignored her, tried to ignore the fact the towel was slipping dangerously, and carried her back up the steps. He coaxed the screen door open with his toe, and went through to the kitchen. He set her in a chair, instantly feeling the cold where her warmth had puddled against his chest.
She tried to stand up. He noticed, even with all the excitement, she was managing to keep her wet chest protected from his gaze.
“Sit,” he ordered, sternly and then did some quick adjustments to the towel.
She gave him a defiant look, took one wobbly step toward the door, and then sank reluctantly back down in the chair. Her eyes darted around his kitchen, which was not in the running for a Better Homes and Gardens feature.
The room was plainly furnished—Formica table, steel-framed chairs with burgundy vinyl padding. His dishes—three or four days worth—were piled in the sink. Her gaze came to rest, with faint disapproval, on the engine he had taken apart on his countertop.
J.D. thought that was just like a woman to be noticing the decorating—or lack thereof—at the very same time she was entertaining the idea she was in mortal danger.
His dog, Beauford, a nice mix between a coonhound and a basset, had been sleeping under the table. He chose that moment to rise on stubby legs, stretch his solid black, white and brown body, and then plop his huge head on her lap. He sniffed impolitely, blinked appealingly with his sad brown eyes, and began to drool.
She squealed, dropping her arms from their defense position across her chest, and pushed the dog’s head out of her lap.
“Filthy beast,” she said, staring at the new wet spot on her pants.
Okay. J.D. could tolerate a lot, and he knew Beauford had a tendency to have bad breath, and he drooled, but that did not a filthy beast make. This was about as much of the home invasion as he could tolerate.
He held up his fingers. He would pronounce her medically sound, and then it was out of here for Miss Priss. Filthy beast, indeed. “How many?”
“Three,” she said, once again folding her arms over the wet spot on her blouse and glaring at him.
“What day is it?”
“June 28.”
“What day were you born?”
“How would you know if I had that right?”
Good point. And the fact that she could make it probably meant her brain wasn’t too badly addled. Time to send her on her way.
But she looked like just the type who would sue if she ended up with a concussion or something so he reluctantly turned from her and got a pack of frozen peas out of the freezer compartment of his fridge. He placed it on the bump on her head, and held it. She closed her eyes, briefly, and then struggled to get up again.
“Just relax,” he said, holding her down with one finger on her shoulder. “I’m not going to hurt you.”
“Then why did you do that?” she asked. Her bosom was heaving sweetly under the thin, wet blouse.
For a moment he thought she was accusing him of knocking her down the stairs. “What exactly did I do?” he snapped.
“You kissed me!”
“Oh, that.” He shrugged, as if it meant nothing, when in actual fact the taste of her lips was lingering sweetly on his mouth. “I thought you were someone else.”
She pondered that, and understanding dawned in the violet depths of her eyes. It was clear she now understood the passionate nature of his relationship with her look-alike.
“You are Jed Turner, aren’t you?”
He tried not to flinch when she said that. Only Elana had ever called him Jed. Everyone else called him J.D.
“John,” he corrected her. “Or J.D. J. D. Turner.”
“I’m Tally Smith. I believe you knew my older sister, Elana,” she said, finding her voice, sticking her chin out at him as if to prove she wasn’t afraid, when she was trembling like a leaf on a silver aspen.
He waited, holding the bag on her forehead, not having any intention of making anything any easier for her.
“I knew her briefly.” He kept his voice curt, devoid of emotion, not a hint in that cold tone of a man who had once sung a love song.
She took a deep breath, contemplated, and then plunged. “She died.”
Two words. He registered them slowly. And realized that for him, Elana had died a long time ago.
He didn’t know what to say. That he was sorry? He was not sure that he was. He was glad when the phone rang, giving him a chance to think. He took Tally Smith’s hand—which was small, and soft and warm—and put it over the frozen bag of peas, then turned to the phone.
“Mrs. Saddlechild? Yeah. It’s ready. Ten bucks. I’ll bring it over tomorrow. My pleasure.” He hung up the phone, wishing it had been a longer call, maybe Clyde phoning to consult about the Mustang, something, anything, that required more of him.
And then he turned back to her. Tally Smith, Elana’s kid sister. Tally looked to be in her mid-twenties. Elana had been his own age, which was thirty now.
She was out of the chair, easing her way, shakily, toward the door. The peas were still pressed obediently against her forehead.
“When did she die?” he asked, reluctantly.
Her eyes were cloudy with pain, and he didn’t think it had all that much to do with the bump on her head.
“Nearly a year ago.”
“And why are you telling me? And why now?”
“I don’t know,” she said.
He could hear something in her voice. It had been in Elana’s voice, too. Mysterious, faintly seductive. But in her voice he could hear smokey mountains, dark green hills, deep, clear water.
Or maybe that was a John Denver song. Elana had come from a prairie town, not very different from this one, across the Canadian border.
“Are you from Saskatchewan?” he asked her.
She nodded.
“You came a long way to tell me.” He could explain to her that he hadn’t seen her sister for years. And that he had known her only briefly. But it seemed to him this stranger in his kitchen was not entitled to know any of the details surrounding his heartbreak.
She looked at him, hard, and he knew, sinkingly, she did know why she had come. She just wasn’t saying.
“Yes, I did come a long way” she said stiffly, and despite the stiffness, he saw the weariness in her. The dog padded after her as if she was his best friend. She gave Beauford a look of distaste, and the teaspoon of sympathy he’d been feeling for her evaporated. What kind of cold-hearted person could dislike Beauford with his beautiful, soulful eyes and slowly wagging stub of a tail?
J.D. followed her out the door, holding the dog back on the top of the steps. She negotiated them without incident this time. He glanced beyond her, and saw a little gray Nissan. It looked like an older model. Those cars went forever. He made note of the Canadian plate.
