He indulged in a much-needed grin. His mom hadn't been nearly this accommodating during his teenage years when he'd been desperate to get any number of girls alone in the woods.

His smile tightened. Her help had come a little too late, not that telling her would accomplish anything. He dropped a kiss on his mother's cheek. "Thanks, Mom. We'll be back in an hour."

"No need to rush!" She waved him off, bracelet jingling.

He walked up behind Lori in the great room as she watched a movie with his dad and two nieces. Lori sat with his niece Jessica in front of her on the floor, braiding her hair. Gray leaned, his mouth two inches shy of hem ear. "Lori?"

"What?" She glanced over her shoulder at him, their faces a whisper apart. Her pupils widened, darkening her eyes to the near black he'd only seen while deep inside her.

"Let's go for a walk. Magda's asleep with my mom and dad watching her. We won't be gone more than an hour."

No lie there, as he couldn't trust himself alone with her for too long.

"All right."

No arguments? Not that he planned to question his luck.

She twisted the rubber band in place on his niece's hair and stood. Careful not to disturb the movie watchers, Lori stepped over his other niece and a bowl of popcorn. As she passed Magda, Lori's hand trailed over the girl's back in an unconscious, affectionate pat. Gray's father shot them an absent wave without looking away from the television.

Gray held the door open for Lori. She tapped the blanket and bag. "Planning a picnic?"

"Mom insisted. It was easier to take it than argue. Hope you're a fan of Cheez Whiz." Gray glanced down at Lori, trying to gauge her reaction to his mother's blatant matchmaking after he'd promised to keep a lid on it.

Lori's eyes crinkled in the corners, her chest shaking with barely suppressed laughter. Damn, how had he made it through the past year without her? The Washington move loomed over him, leaving him with none of the usual excitement he experienced at a new assignment.

He extended his hand. She stared, her brow puckered like Magda's when she tried to decide between a healthy cheese stick and a gooey chocolate cookie. Lori's face smoothed, and she rested her soft hand in his.

It felt almost as good as sex.

Okay, not quite that awesome. But damned good. Even a small measure of Lori's trust was a powerful commodity.

She linked her fingers with his, and they walked across the parking lot toward a patch of woods away from the water. "You have a wonderful family."

"Thanks." Not perfect by a long shot, but who was he to throw stones? Bottom line, he loved them.

"What made your parents decide to settle here?"

"It's Mom's hometown. Retiring here was Dad's pay-back for all those years of moving around." Their arms swung between them as they left the parking lot to stroll along a narrowing sandy path. "We lived nearby anytime Dad went overseas so Mom would have family to help out."

"Family's important."

Sliding into silence, they walked and Gray wondered what the hell he would say to her when they stopped. Parking lot lights faded, the night darkening to warm shadows cast by stars and a harvest moon. He tugged his hand free and palmed her back as they trekked over a hill, past a battle ground marker.

Almost there.

Sprawling pines blocked the condos from view, closing them off from the world. "This is it."

She dusted her toe through dried pine needles while he whipped out the blanket, fluttering it to the ground. He waited for her to sit. Lori studied the blanket as if its quilted pattern held secrets to the universe.

"Lori? Problem?"

She shook her head. "No. I was just thinking about something your mother said."

Did he even want to know? Cheez Whiz might be a safer option.

Or maybe not.

In days past, they would have found better uses for Cheez Whiz than wasting it on a cracker. He dropped the sack. "What words of wisdom does Mom have for us today?"

Lori shrugged. "How about we call a truce for tonight? No talk about matchmaking or goodbyes. Just you and me. One last evening together."

He lifted a lock of her hair and rubbed its silky length between two fingers before releasing it into a gliding rest against her breast.

Not a bad place to be. "Sounds good to me."

Lori sank to the blanket, kicked her sandals free and drew her knees up. Her silky dress pooled around her. Gray hunkered down onto the blanket beside her, wincing as last twinges of the bends creaked through him. Pine needles cushioned the ground beneath the blanket. His back propped against a weather-worn oak, he stretched his legs in front of him, his feet only an inch away from her hip.

Wind lifted Lori's hair. "Did you bring me out here to see your etchings, flyboy?"

Gray snorted on a laugh. "If I had, you'd already be on your back."

"Or you would be on yours."

"Now there's a thought." He grasped her bare foot, his thumb rubbing the arch. When she didn't pull away, he draped his other wrist over his bent knee and pointed. "That star right there. Betelgeuse. It was the first one my dad taught me. Even before 'Nam, Dad had a low tolerance for noise. When family gatherings got to be too much for him, he would bring me out here with him. He taught me about celestial navigation."

"What a beautiful memory." Her chin fell to rest on her knees.

A year ago she would have leaned back in his arms.

"We didn't have a lot of money, but he spent time with us." Gray targeted another star with his finger and continued squeezing her foot gently. The heat and softness of her surged up his arm. "That one there. Polaris. You could follow it straight over the North Pole and down to Vietnam."

"And you went there in your mind." She stared up at the star, her voice as sure as if she'd watched him sit in his special spot all those lonely nights as a kid.

"At least a thousand times." His head tipped back against the rough bark. The stars shimmered and blurred. "God, Lori, he was a mess when he got home. What they did to my dad…"

Gray tried to swallow but couldn't.

A rustle from the blanket pulled his attention from the sky. Lori tugged her foot free and crawled toward him. Her knees straddled either side of his extended legs as they sat face-to-face.

The swirl of peach preceded her lips by a millisecond.

She cupped his face in her hands, pressing her mouth to his, firm, grounding him. Right now the sky held little allure as Lori threw herself against him like a warm barrier against painful memories.

He whispered against her lips. "I'm going to miss you so damned much. The past year—"

"Stop it." She kissed one eye. "Stop talking." Then the other eye. "We're not any good at farewells, anyway." She kissed his mouth.

Popcorn. She tasted like buttery popcorn and Lori, and he wanted more of her.

Gray bit back words, surprising words that would beg her to go with him to Washington. She'd turned him down a year ago. Why would now be different? And if she accepted? If anything, he should protect her by keeping his damned mouth shut.

Or otherwise occupied.

He tasted, drank of her, like a drug, potent and healing. Lori, the real healer, and as always he took from her. But, damn it, with his defenses in the negative numbers, he couldn't turn her away yet.

Her lips worked over him, open, tongues twining. Close. Not close enough. Gripping her hips, he drew her securely onto his lap. Her sundress caressed the top of his hands, Lori's silky skin and satiny panties tempted beneath his touch. Chest to chest, hearts thudding, he held her and stole more, everything she would give him.

Trailing up her sides, his fingers splayed, cupped and lifted her small breasts. A perfect fit, filling his hands and senses with the same incredible rightness he'd experienced the first time he'd touched her.

Impatient hands, hers and his, shoved open the vee neck of her wraparound dress and popped the front clasp on her bra. No more waiting, he closed his mouth over one nipple, already peaked and ready for him.

Humid air and need prickled beads of sweat along his brow. Lori sipped them from his skin.

He wanted her. So simple. So everything.

Always, always it had been explosive between them, and he was tired of running from it. He wanted the rockets, explosion, the damn fireworks she offered.

Thought became difficult, if not impossible when she touched him. Playfulness had always come after a combustible release. He wasn't feeling at all playful. A year without her had left him struggling to level out, when he wanted nothing more than to soar out of control.

His hand snaked under her dress again and found the smooth bare skin of her hips, waist, stomach. He explored the line of her panties with one lazy finger, two barely there scraps of satin attached with fragile straps. So very Lori, conservative and in control on the outside, seductive satin and heat underneath.

He traced the whisper-thin straps, traveled down, slipping inside. She moaned into his hair, her breath a hot caress against his scalp.

She shoved him back against the tree, determination in the firm force of her hands. He knew her moods well. Competent, resolute Lori had set her mind on a mission.

He prepped to crash and burn.

Fumbling down the buttons of his shirt, she kissed and nipped her way along his collarbone. Her hands continued their frantic path down to his shorts, unsnapping, unzipping, freeing him, robbing him of the option to stop.

Her dress swirled around them, shielding her caressing hand. Not that he could have seen anything other than the back of his eyelids as his head thudded against the tree. His fingers knotted in the thin straps along her hips. "Lori, do you know where we're headed?"

"Yes! I've known since you spread the blanket on the ground. No backing out this time."

Her moist heat pressing against him fired straight through, leaving Gray grateful for the support of the sturdy oak behind his back. This woman fascinated the hell out of him and flipped his world all at the same time. And he would lay claim to her again in seconds. If only for this night.

His fingers glided a teasing stroke along the satiny outside, before twisting in the tiny strings along her hips. He tugged the strings, needing everything that scrap of satin caressed. "If you expect these panties to live to see another day, maybe you'd better—"

"Break it. Now!" She slid her heat along his thigh.

He snapped the strings along with the last remnants of his restraint.

She guided him in with a frenzied pace that still seemed agonizingly gradual to him. She sank onto him, enveloped him with incredible moist heat, Lori's heat. His hands cradling her bottom beneath her dress, he lifted, then relaxed his grip, thrusting up as she slid down. His forehead met hers as they exchanged sighs, unmoving, savoring.

He lost himself in the satiny glide of her hair against his neck. Being surrounded by her silk and softness was better than escaping to miles of blue sky.

His mind tried to tug him from the moment with irritating niggles that he should stop, clear his brain. Something wasn't right.

Impatiently she rocked against him, and he forgot how to think. He tried to slow her, needing to make it last for her, for him, because he didn't even want to think about it being over.

Which it would be soon if she didn't stop moving.

She kissed, bit, suckled his lip, immersing him in the taste of popcorn and her need. Instincts kicked in, and they reclaimed their rhythm with ease, moving, touching, encouraging the other toward the shattering end they both wanted. Needed.

He heard her breath quicken, felt the tiny tremors shake through her, early clenches he knew predicted her nearing release. And he knew something else about her. Lori was loud, something he adored about her and wished he could enjoy, but scavenged enough reason to know now wasn't the time or place.

With only a second to spare, Gray clamped his mouth over hers, swallowing her scream as she arched, once, twice, again until she sagged against him. Moaning, she shuddered with aftershocks, gripping him in a satin fist of heat.