Love Beyond Reason(36)

His firm lips moved over hers with tantalizing non- commitment. He nibbled at her lower lip until Katherine opened it to permit him entry. Still he refrained, exploring her lips with a lazy tongue.

She moaned and moved closer, clasping him around the neck with both hands and forcing his head lower. Only then did he satisfy her longing. His mouth took hers with a sweet violence. His kiss made her body sing with sensations that touched her soul.

With a detached part of her brain, Katherine asked herself how he was able to so effortlessly render her completely helpless. How does he command my senses so totally? I mustn't surrender to what I'm feeling. But I want to. I want him.

These thoughts raced through her mind even as she drank the nectar of his mouth. Then Jace moved his head and discovered a new region of her mouth to explore, and all other thoughts were banished.

Katherine felt the pummeling fists on her chest and only then did she realize that Allison was crushed between them. She dropped her arms from Jace's neck and slowly backed away.

They looked down at the offended baby lying between them. The infant face crumpled in indignation, and Allison began to squall loudly.

"Now look what we've done," Jace said. Placatingly, he raised Allison to his shoulder and patted her back. "Come on, princess, I'll make it all up to you." As he went into the kitchen, he said over his shoulder, "I'll feed her. You play with your new toy."

Katherine didn't argue. She sat at the new desk and picked up the instruction booklet.

"This manual looks like an encyclopedia," she called into the kitchen. "I'm going to have to study for hours before I'll feel adequate to even turn the typewriter on."

"You can handle it," Jace called back.

Almost an hour had passed before Katherine was roused from her absorption in the instruction manual. Jace was carrying Allison through the living room on the way to her bedroom. "She's fed. I even managed to get most of that disgusting-looking stuff in her mouth. She kept me company while I made a batch of my famous spaghetti sauce. Is that okay with you?"

"Sounds deli- cious."

"It needs to simmer for a while. You stay where you are and I'll put Allison to bed."

By the time he finished the sentence, Katherine was again bent over the typewriter, lost in its many intricacies.

A startled cry of pain jolted her out of her diligent study. She dropped the heavy book and ran toward the bedroom.

* * *



Chapter 9

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Katherine swung open the door and flew into the room. It was empty. She stared at the vacant crib stupidly until she heard another sharp gasp and a vicious "Ouch!" before realizing that Jace's cries were coming from the bathroom.

Katherine hurried to the doorway. She halted abruptly, frozen in astonishment.

Jace and Allison were in the bathtub. The contrast of Allison's smooth, white bottom against Jace's dark, hair-matted chest was startling. Even more startling to Katherine was the sight of Jace's naked body submerged in the warm water as he reclined in the bathtub. Even his knees, raised to accommodate his long body in the short tub, didn't screen his masculinity from her amazed and involuntarily curious eyes.

"Oh, Katherine, thank God. Help me." Jace winced in pain, and, for the first time, she noted the source of his distress.

Allison was lying on her stomach along his chest. Each of her tiny, plump fists was clamped around a handful of the hair on Jace's chest. In her excitement over finding this rare new toy, Allison's fists were clenching tighter each second. Her small legs were kicking against his flat stomach in delight.

Katherine swallowed the large lump that was blocking her breathing passages and murmured, "I'll just get her off..." She leaned down and grasped the wet, wriggling body around her chubby waist.

"No!" Jace exclaimed in panic. "If you do that, I'll be depilated, and that tends to smart."

Katherine looked at the tiny fingers which seemed helplessly enmeshed in the dark hair and saw that he was right.

"What..." she started to ask.

"See if you can unwind the hair from around her fingers. I'm afraid to let go of her. She's as slippery as an eel."

Katherine closed her eyes for a moment and drew a deep, restorative breath. Then she knelt down beside the bathtub. She worked the small fingers of Allison's hand until they relaxed and released their grip on the crisp, wet curls. When the first fist was free, Jace reached up and grasped it, holding it away from him.

Katherine worked with the other fist, leaning over his body in order to see what she was doing. She refused to feel the breath that stirred her hair as her head was bent close to his chin.

Finally, Jace was free from Allison's painful grip, but instead of handing her over to an anxious Katherine, he quickly stood up with the baby still in his arms.

"I ought to spank you for that, young lady," Jace chided Allison. "From now on when we take a bath together, I'll wear a T-shirt."

Immodestly, he walked naked into the bedroom, still carrying Allison and drying her with a soft towel. He ignored Katherine after saying "Thanks, honey" over his retreating shoulder.

Katherine skirted by him as she went through the bedroom. He was dressing Allison in her pajamas as he leaned over the crib. His taut hips were only one shade lighter than his broad, smooth back. They tapered from his narrow waist into long, muscled thighs. Katherine hurried through the door into the living room.