“What about the honor and fear factor?”

“I try to do what I think is right. I don’t know if that’s being honorable. As for fear-” He smiled, leaning in close to her. “I’m not afraid of you, Mollie.”

She folded her arms on her chest in an effort to be cool, collected. “Does that mean I’m invited in?”

He stepped back from the door, motioning her inside with a mock bow and a sweep of his arm. Mollie eased past him. His apartment was silent and still, no television or CD playing, no reptiles stirring in their cages. As stripped down as Jeremiah’s tastes were, she felt comfortable. She remembered waltzing around the pink bedroom in Leonardo’s house, picking out her dress for the ball, caught up in the luxury and temptation of diamonds and rubies and beautiful clothes, all fun, but, somehow, not as real as standing in Jeremiah’s apartment with his books, CDs, videos, newspapers, magazines, simple furnishings, lizard, turtle, and snake.

“As much as I hate to admit it,” he said behind her, “I understand where Bennie, Albert, and Sal were coming from tonight. We’ve gotten to know each other, sitting out whittling, eating bagels in the morning, smoking an occasional cigar. They don’t know about you and our week together, but they know about me. The work I do, my commitment to it-and my determination not to inflict myself on a relationship that can’t last.”

Mollie turned to him, emotion and desire knotting her insides. A seriousness seemed to have enveloped him, darkening his eyes, bringing out the harsh angles of his face. But she didn’t regret her decision to walk back up to his apartment. “Jeremiah, right now I’m not worried about what can last and what can’t last. I’m not here about anything except tonight.”

“I don’t want to hurt you again.”

“That’s the risk we take, isn’t it?”

“Maybe it is.” He moved to her, toe to toe, and curved an arm around her waist, his mouth finding hers as he whispered, “I’m awfully glad I didn’t have to follow you up to Palm Beach tonight.”

“Would you have spied on me?”

“Darlin’, I’d have found some way inside your gates.”

He slipped his hands under her shirt and opened his palms against her warm, bare skin, sending waves of sensation through her as their mouths came together again, and she said between kisses, “I brought a change of clothes, just in case. They’re down in the car.”

His eyes flashed, sending more tremors through her with their blatant desire. “What about my plan for us to steer clear of each other?”

She drew her arms around him, felt the strong muscles of his back. “Did you think even for a half-second that would work?”

“It seemed like a good idea.” Again, the seriousness descended. “Mollie, if I’ve brought trouble down on your head-”

“It’s okay, Jeremiah.” She kissed him softly, easing herself against his chest. “I’m not twenty anymore.”

“No,” he said, smoothing his hands up her back, triggering memories that she thought she’d suppressed forever, “but I wouldn’t be surprised if you still sit on a musical note towel and listen to opera on the beach. Mollie, Mollie…I’ve never known anyone like you.”

She laughed, the rest of her quaking with a yearning that reached her soul. “I haven’t had a lot of Jeremiah Tabaks walking around in my life.”

“We don’t have to figure out our lives tonight.”

And he swept her into his arms and down the short hall to his bedroom, where the blinds were pulled against the dark night and the furnishings just as utilitarian as the rest of his apartment. It was as if ten years of pent-up desire suddenly was released. His mouth found hers again and again, her mind numbing with the sensation that he was drinking in all of her with their kisses.

“Don’t close your eyes,” he said, “stay with me now. I don’t want you to pretend this is a memory. See me as I am now, Mollie. Love me as I am now.”

“And you’ll do the same?”

“I am. I have been.”

And he kissed her, slowly this time, savoring, tasting, easing any last tension from her body. Soon, every muscle was warm, loose, vibrating with a desire that had been a part of her for so long, dormant, waiting for the day it would explode again.

“Jeremiah…” She breathed, focused for a moment on the stillness around them. “I didn’t think I’d ever let myself want you again.” She smiled, kissing him. “And it had nothing to do with honor.”

“If I could undo…”

“Don’t go there. I had to figure me out before I could figure us out. But what I’ve realized-” She inhaled at a jolt of desire that rocked her to her very soul. “I’ve realized that the figuring out isn’t ever really finished. Change is inevitable. We just can’t leave behind the wrong things.”

“Mollie.”

“Hm.”

“We can talk now or we can make love now.”

She smiled. “It’s that one-track mind of yours, isn’t it?”

She lay back on his bed, and he came with her, peeling her shirt over her head and casting it off onto the floor. His eyes locked with hers as he skimmed his palms up over the curve of her hips, leaving hot pools of lava in their wake. She could feel his arousal pushing against his pants, against her, inhaled sharply just at the thought of him bursting free.

His palms suddenly slid over her breasts, and she dug her hands into his sides, eased them up over his sleek, hard muscles. He lowered his head, slowly, her breasts swelling even as she imagined his mouth on them, and then with excruciating care and patience, he took one nipple between his lips, tugged gently, followed with his tongue, and finally his teeth, until she was bubbling hot, molten, tearing her hands up and down his back. He didn’t speed up, she didn’t divert him from his task. He eased off her shorts and underpants, using mouth and tongue and teeth to make her delirious with wanting and take her to the very edge of exploding.

“Now,” she said, amazed at the urgency she was feeling, the strangled sound of her own voice, “please, don’t wait.”

He drew back, tugged off his clothes, threw them every which way, and fell on her, all restraint gone, his patience as exhausted as her own. She had no chance to explore him, to move across his body with hand and tongue. “Stay with me,” he murmured, settling heavily between her legs. “Don’t close your eyes, don’t lose me.” He plunged into her, moaning softly as he seemed to savor the feel of their bodies intertwined. “We’re here, together, now.”

There were no more words after that, no possibility of speech or thought. When the explosion came, it was more than Mollie could have imagined, not just erupting out of her, but into her, into him, its heat and ferocity fusing them together. She was aware of nothing beyond him, herself, the moment. Warm, her muscles liquid now, she felt him scooping her onto her pillows, holding her as he drew the covers up over them both.

She cuddled up against him, but even as she was drifting off, her body refusing to stay awake any longer, she knew that it would be a long time yet before he would sleep. At his core, she realized, Jeremiah was a man who needed-was compelled by the force of his nature-to think beyond the moment. He would have to ponder what they’d done and all its ramifications, and how and if and whether what they had together should last.

Jeremiah didn’t fall asleep until well after midnight, but he was up again at dawn, restless, prowling his apartment as if he were in a cage himself. He peeked in on Mollie, asleep in his bed, her pale hair spilling across his hunter green sheets, only her bare creamy shoulders exposed. He saw their clothes tossed all over the floor. He saw the cotton blanket she’d kicked off in the night.

Mollie Lavender, in his bed, in his apartment. In his life, he thought, once more.

And in trouble. For certain. He just couldn’t fit the pieces together yet and see the clear picture of what, how, who all was involved.