LITMIR.BIZ

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boy with the look of a Nordic warrior about him and warned her brother-in-law of danger ahead.

      Papa had just laughed. Both Rafe and Danni knew the way things worked on Mancini land. She lived in the big house, Rafe lived in the workers’ camp near the river. They were friends, yes, but nothing more. It was good for her to test her woman’s powers on someone who wouldn’t take advantage of her.

      Besides, Danni had been promised to Marco Fabrizio in her cradle. Everyone in the valley knew they would marry on her eighteenth birthday, uniting two proud families.

      Still, on her sixteenth birthday, Papa had sat her down and told her about her family bloodlines and her responsibility to keep herself unsullied for Mark.

      Danni had listened, but she hadn’t really heard. She only cared about Rafe, who, despite her developing body, treated her with the same brotherly affection as always. And then one hot August day it happened. She’d been washing Papa’s new Mercedes, wearing only skimpy cut-offs and a halter top. Rafe had spent the day pruning vines and had stripped off his shirt in order to duck under the spray to cool off. They ended up fighting over the hose and her top had gotten soaked. The thin fabric had clung to her breasts, revealing nipples that stood out like hard pebbles.

      Rafe’s breath had hissed in, and he’d stood transfixed, the hose still in his hand. The laughter in his eyes had given way to a heated look that had made her mouth grow dry. It had taken her a moment to notice the distinctive bulge behind the fly of his worn work jeans.

      As soon as he’d seen the direction of her gaze, he’d turned a fiery red, thrown down the hose and stalked off toward the river. After that everything was different. Instead of teasing her mercilessly the way he had for years, he’d taken to turning red every time she came close. When he’d tried to talk to her, he’d actually stammered.

      That summer big, tough Rafe Cardoza started bringing her wildflowers. Lord, but she’d gloried in her new power.

      All that changed when he kissed her for the first time. Then she’d been the one whose words hadn’t come out right. The one who turned red with a melting heat that made her restless inside. She’d learned then that kisses were addictive. Like all addictions, however, she soon craved more. So, it seemed, did he.

      They’d met in secret at first, usually in the grassy, sun-dappled spot beneath a corkscrew willow where Rafe had taught her to fish. No one in their families had known how things had changed between them. Not until Rafe had asked her to his senior prom. She’d been wild with excitement. Not even Mark Fabrizio’s anger when he’d found out had dented her bliss.

      The night before the prom had been unseasonably hot. The big old farmhouse hadn’t been air-conditioned in those days, and the fan by her bed only served to move the steamy air around in a thick circle. When Rafe had thrown pebbles at her window to get her attention, then suggested a moonlight swim, she’d been more than ready.

      Instead of taking her to their spot by the river Rafe had decided to go to the pond instead because the path to the river was treacherous at night, even when the moon was high. In the pond, hidden behind a thick tangle of blackberry canes, they’d played in the cool water like kids, splashing and ducking one another.

      Realizing that sound carried, Rafe had stifled her giggles with his hand first and then his mouth. Those playful kisses soon grew more passionate, their mutual touching more intimate. Soon his hands were sliding into the cups of her bathing suit to massage her breasts, and hers were tugging at his trunks.

      Bathed in silver, they explored one another awkwardly, driven by their wild need for one another. They’d made promises, spoken words of love that seemed shiny and new. She’d explored his body with a frank interest that seemed to arouse him even more, until finally something seemed to snap inside him.

      It happened fast then, the two of them kissing frantically as they stripped off their suits. His eyes had grown hot when he’d looked at her naked body for the first time, and his hands had trembled as they’d explored her with a touching reverence.

      With each virgin touch, new sensations had thrummed through her, until she’d been writhing beneath his hand, desperate for something she couldn’t quite understand.

      She’d been sobbing in pleasure and need when he’d parted her thighs. There would be pain, she knew, but it would pass, and then he would be inside her. Eagerly she reached for him, opening her legs wider. She remembered a feeling of moist warmth and then his body was covering hers. She braced for the invasion—and then he had rolled away from her, his breath coming in harsh gasps and those big fists clenched tightly.

      He must have explained, but the words were lost to her now. Or perhaps she simply hadn’t listened. The terrible feeling of humiliation and hurt, though, she remembered vividly to this day.

      The next morning, with her eyes swollen from the copious tears she’d shed and her throat raw from the sobs she’d swallowed so that no one would hear, she’d found out that they’d been seen. By whom, she’d never known for certain. One of her brothers, probably. It hardly mattered. The damage had been done.

      Her father’s brown eyes had been filled with disappointment and sorrow when he’d told her that her brother had confronted Rafe with the truth and insisted that he marry her. Danni had felt a rush of joy, only to have her heart ripped in two when Papa had added in a tight, angry voice that Rafe had left the valley instead. If there was a baby, it was agreed between her father and Tonio Fabrizio that Mark would claim it as his own.

      At first no one believed that she was still a virgin. But when her period arrived on schedule, they’d given her the benefit of the doubt. Or so she’d thought, until Mark had been visibly shocked on their wedding night to discover her untouched. Humiliated and angry all over again, she’d cried into her pillow after he’d gone to sleep.

      She’d never seen Rafe again.

      Both Rosaria and Enrique were careful never to mention him in her presence. On the rare occasions when she happened to run into one of his brothers or sisters, his name never came up. But he was always there, a silent, invisible presence.

      Once the family star, he’d become a pariah overnight, his name erased from the tattered Bible that had been one of the few family possessions Enrique’s father had brought with him from Mexico after his parents had been killed in a flash flood in their small village near Oaxaca.

      Not only had Rafe shamed his family by violating the daughter of their patron, but he’d also added to his sins by refusing to restore her honor by marrying her. As far as Enrique was concerned, the son he’d once adored was dead. He was not to be welcomed into their home if he returned. No one was to speak his name or pray for him on Holy Days.

      Rosaria was forbidden to cry for him. But she had, Danni knew. Sobbing into her apron in the pantry of the old farmhouse where no one could hear.

      Danni had cried too. Buckets. She’d lost weight because she couldn’t eat and cut her hair short because Rafe had loved it long. She burned her scrapbooks and photo albums and everything he’d ever given her. Nothing had helped.

      It’s just puppy love, cara mía, Papa had said, holding her while she sobbed.

      It was better this way, she’d see. Rafe would never have felt comfortable in the big house on the hill and she hadn’t been raised to live in a trailer in the migrants’ camp. Rafe would never be able to provide for her the way she deserved. The best he could hope for was a job as foreman like his father, or maybe a job as a mechanic, if he really worked hard. No, it was better for everyone that he’d left.

      Only now, it seemed, Rafe Cardoza had come back. Bigger, tougher, with eyes that looked as though they’d forgotten how to laugh and a dangerous edge to his personality.

      A man of substance, Papa, she thought, breathing in steam. A man who wore beautifully tailored suits as though born to them and carried himself with a steely confidence. And unlike the last time she’d seen him, a man who was clearly accustomed to being in charge.

      Of Agent Gresham, perhaps, she thought lifting her chin in a way her brothers would

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