Ask No Tomorrows (10 page)

Mating, that
was the word that described it best, as their kisses became a
silent rapture. But he wanted to be gentle with her as he knew she
was inexperienced even though the kiss seemed to send fire through
his veins. The storm outside couldn’t compare to the storm raging
in Sam. The need for a woman swamped him like a warm embrace, but
the sanity of the moment escaped him. Gone were the worries that
she was white and he was black, replaced by the need to be one,
only one. Their lips needed no coaching or instruction as they
mixed breaths and sought the sweet nectar.

The wind
sucked and pulled at them, but Sam braced himself and held her
tight.

They smothered
the wicked storm with the sweetness of unbridled passion. He just
kept kissing her, tasting her, drowning in her.

Sam was
careful not to touch her except where his arms wrapped about her,
but the thoughts of touching seeped inside his head when she jumped
forcing her young body against his, when a loud crash overhead
sounded. His hands wrapped around her and under her high young
breast, as his thumb slipped up to encircle the taut peaks. It
wasn’t deliberate, but natural as breathing. She moaned softly into
his mouth. He cradled her in his arms, protecting, loving,
dreaming. She sighed loudly. The need of touching urged his body to
respond quite naturally to hers.

Their tongues
danced slowly, tasting, devouring, mating.

Sam realized
with clarity that she was only the second girl he’d ever kissed and
none so thoroughly. His mind warred with his body. On one hand
Riley was ripe for the pickings, but on the other, she was innocent
as a new born babe too. He caressed her mouth like a newly budded
flower, kissing, nipping, tasting once more and mating, always
mating.

His thumbs
memorized the sweet swell of her small breast.

When he heard
himself moan, he moved his thumbs away. Trying to bring sanity to
the moment, but unwilling to release her totally, he crushed her
against him.

He’d think on
the reasons he shouldn’t later. Right now, sensations swamped him
as she pressed herself against him. He felt the instant swell of
her young breasts against his chest and he sighed that he could
feel them without even touching her there. He closed his eyes,
savoring the moment. But because he had to hold her so tight, he
felt everything as though magnified. As though her body imprinted
against his own. He realized his own manhood sprang up and against
her so she had to have noticed. But the need to taste her deeper
and deeper grew within him. He heard himself growl at his own
impatience.

When they
finally backed away for a moment, they were both panting and their
eyes were sparkling with such joy. He could see the shine in her
eyes through the darkness. He realized with clarity he’d just
touched a piece of heaven. And he wanted to go on touching it
forever. He pulled her up against him once more and kissed her
nose, her eyes, her cheeks and then back to her waiting lips very
slowly, like a fine whiskey. His hands went under her arms to haul
her up hard against him. He wanted her to know how badly he wanted
her.

She didn’t
back away or even act as though she wanted to. She answered him
with kisses, and when he began to pull away, she kissed his eyes,
his nose, and his cheeks and back to his waiting lips.

It was
insanity; it was heaven.

And having
anything personally to do with her was asking for more trouble than
either of them could imagine. He’d seen that much with his own
sister and brother-in-law. But the love his sister and
brother-in-law shared was richer and more powerful than anything,
he’d learned quickly, and something deep within Sam wanted the same
thing. That powerful pull of love had impressed him growing up and
he knew he wanted the same. And right now, he was on the verge of
finding it, and he knew that too.

Still, he had
to end it, somehow. He never dreamed it would be such sweet torture
to let her go. In that moment he began to understand the love
between Hattie and Lee. At this moment he knew he’d stand beside
Riley through anything, he’d never leave her and he’d always
protect her. He’d marked her as his own, and there would be no
walking away from her now, even if she wanted it. Although, he
could never tell her. He was certain of it. And yet, for her own
good, he needed to walk away from her, now!

The tornado
swept away and the kiss ended with silent regret.

Silence sliced
the air, stillness replaced passion and turmoil.

He stood there
staring at her through the darkness, panting for breath, his pulse
pounding in his head.

But with
silent clarity he also knew he had to control things too. He willed
his own body to calm, knowing the effort it would take to come down
off the high they created. No woman had ever stirred him to such
passion.

Sam moved
away, cleared his throat and looked above them. Where the door once
stood, was the sky peeping in on them. It wasn’t as dark now. He
didn’t move, he couldn’t. Not yet. He needed this extra time to
control himself.

“
It’s gone,” was all he could manage to say.

The sky
lightened a bit and he saw her face. Sweet and innocent, his mind
echoed, and pink as a flower in first bloom.

“
I
was never so scared in my life,” she whispered, not taking her eyes
from him. “It felt like it was ripping the skin off my
face…”

“
Yeah,” he muttered miserably.

“
It
won’t come back, will it?” she asked, peeping out at the night
sky.

“
No…it won’t come back. But maybe we better ride…”

She nodded.
Nodog got to his feet.

For once, she
didn’t bombard him with questions he couldn’t answer. She was
silent and he appreciated it.

Chapter Seven

The smell of a
clean earth hit them the minute they stepped out of the cellar. As
though the Lord Himself swept the land clean. But the sight before
them was appalling. What once was a house now lay in a mass of
timber and boards. The coffee pot had blown clean away. The chimney
began to crumble, piece by piece. A tree lay on its side, uprooted
like an onion in a garden. The horse was nowhere to be found. They
were afoot now and this wasn’t good.

Nodog sniffed
about, patrolling the area around them.

Sam studied
the land, and then he glanced at Riley. Riley was staring out at
the remains. Her eyes were brilliantly blue, her cheeks pink from
the friction of their kisses. Her mouth was raw and red and looked
so tempting. She was beautiful, Sam realized in that moment. He was
an inch from telling her how he felt, but he held his
tongue.

“
Maybe we better cut that hair of yours and bind you up,” Sam
said, studying her instead of the remains.

“
Cut my hair. Do we have to do
that
? Can’t I just stuff it?” Her eyes grew wide.

“
Naw, you cain’t. Your hat blew off in the wind. If your hat
was to blow off in front of someone, or someone took it off they
would see you was a girl. We’ve got to cut it; it’ll grow back,
Riley,” Sam assured her, taking a knife from his pocket. “You’ll
see, when this is all over, you’ll have your hair and your ranch
back.”

“
I-I hate cutting it. It’s one of my better features,” she
protested.

“
It
is; that’s a fact. I’ve never seen prettier hair in my life, Riley,
but this is more important,” Sam explained, coming toward her with
the knife in his hand. He remembered how his fingers ran through
her hair when they kissed, how soft it had been against his
fingertips and he hated to cut it off, but she’d never pass for a
boy if her hat blew off.

He made her
sit on a stump where obviously the previous owner had used it as a
chopping board for splitting logs. Then, by the light of the
dimming day, he began to whack off her hair, until it was short
enough to pass for a boy. He plopped the hat back on her head and
checked his work out.

“
That’s better.” Sam nodded. Her eyes looked bigger now with
her hair short. “Your eyes sure look bigger since I whacked that
off. I thought you’d be butt ugly with it short, but instead you
have the eyes of an angel.”

And more
beautiful, but he couldn’t tell her that.

Riley stared
at him, speechless.

“
What’s the matter?” He saw tears held back in her
eyes.

“
No
one’s ever said anything that nice to me, Sam.”

Riley glanced
down at her hair on the wet ground as Sam put his knife away and
bent down, stuffing a small wad of her hair into his pocket before
she saw him.

“
Now what?” she asked.

Sam went to
his saddle bags he had placed in the cellar during the storm. “You
take this behind them trees and you wrap yourself tight then put
your shirt back on. You can do it, can’t you?”

He waited for
her answer, his hands shaking as he handed her the
bandages.

“
I
guess so…”

“
That should take care of the other.” He cleared his
throat.

Riley stared
at him for a moment. “I won’t use it all.”

“
Naw, we got plenty…”

“
Okay, I’ll be back in a minute.” She smiled shyly.

“
Yeah…” He nodded.

Riley went
behind the bushes and peeled off her shirt. She glanced down at
herself and then began wrapping the bandages around her until it
was snug against her. She tied it off and put her shirt back
on.

When she
returned, she lifted her arms and smiled. “Guess that takes care of
most of it, don’t it?”

“
Yeah, but come here,” he coaxed, his face still not relaxing
as he spoke.

She came up to
him. “What now?”

He cut himself
on the arm with the knife, she gasped when she saw the blood ooze
on his arm, and reached to comfort him, but when he reached inside
her shirt to smear the blood on the bandage she stood very still
and stared up at him. They were close enough to kiss again, but Sam
knew that would take them to a place that was unwise. One of them
had to use control.

“
What are you doin’?” she protested, trying to wiggle away when
he smeared the blood from his arm on her. He touched her bare skin
once and jerked his hand out quickly as though it were burned from
contact.

“
Calm down. If anyone sees you bandaged, they might wonder why.
Now we can say you were hurt in the tornado when a branch hit you
and we had to tie your ribs up.” Sam nodded his
satisfaction.

“
Oh…that’s good thinkin’, Sam.” She smiled. “That would never
have occurred to me. I guess I’m not big enough to worry about
this, but it will give me more confidence.”

Almost as
though mumbling to himself, he muttered, “You’re big enough, Riley.
You’re perfect.”

But aloud, he
merely said, “Yeah…I reckon it will do.” Sam agreed and turned to
pick up his saddle bags and sling them over his shoulder. “We’re
gonna have to walk, maybe we’ll catch up to the horse soon. I
unhobbled him just before the storm and he run off like I figured
he would. He won’t have gone too far, just out of the line of the
storm. Nodog can sniff him out in no time for us.”

“
You got a lot of faith in that dog, don’t you?”

“
Well, sure I do. He’s part wolf, and he knows things…” Sam
laughed.

“
Sometimes I think animals have more sense than people. They
instinctively know more about nature. Ever notice how things smell
so good after a storm?” Riley breathed in deeply, inhaling the
scent of the earth settling once more. “Kinda like God Himself
cleaned the earth.”

“
Reckon I’m always too busy noticing the effects of the storm,
Riley,” Sam acknowledged. “I guess men don’t take the time to
notice a lot of things.”

“
You can actually smell the earth,” Riley said, dancing about,
her boots splashing water all over.

“
I
guess it is cleaner.” Sam watched her from a distance away. “Shore
does clear things away, don’t it?”

“
How do you know so much, Sam?” Riley gasped. “I mean, about
surviving and life.”

“
Told you…I lived with the Indians. Indians know a lot about
things ordinary people don’t know. They can teach you a lot about
survival, life and how to live on the land.” Sam glanced about
again. “We best be movin’ along now, it’ll be dark in another hour
and harder to find the horse.”

Sam walked
about the place once more, picking up odd and end things from the
ground that they might need later and tying them to his saddle.
Riley followed him.

“
Sam…” Riley called to him as they began walking. “‘Bout in
there…”

Sam stopped
dead in his tracks and turned to look at her. “We won’t speak of it
again. You was scared, and that’s all there was to it. Truth be
told, so was I. I did what I could, to take your mind off the
storm, that’s all it was Riley. Don’t make no more out of it than
that, you hear?”

“
That how you want it, Sam?” Riley asked, staring at him
now.