Authors: Carol Finch
Determined to test her theory, Rozalyn remained as still as a stone statue while his raven head deliberately drew nearer. His sensuous mouth slanted across her lips, which were frozen in a contemptuous frown.
Husky laughter rumbled in Hawk's massive chest when he planted what was to be a passionate kiss on unyielding lips. Although Rozalyn had intended to prove a point, Hawk considered her cool indifference a challenge. One dark eyebrow rose, and he withdrew to study the stubborn set of Rozalyn's jaw.
"Do you think your hatred for me can change the way our bodies sing when they touch?" he asked. His index finger trailed over her bare shoulder to circle the peak of her breast, teasing it to tautness. "Do not lie to yourself, Roz, Nothing can smother the spark of passion between us."
His caresses wandered over her body as if he hungered for her alone, but Rozalyn knew better than that. She willfully rejected the warm tide of pleasure that rippled across her skin when his exploring hands molded themselves to the curve of her hips. His touch was magical, but his kisses were poisonous. If she drank fully from his lips, her mind would become paralyzed and all would be lost. There was no cure for his spell. Abstinence was her only salvation.
"I have already told you that my response to your lovemaking was merely an act," she managed to say. "I only pretended to enjoy your touch, but I no longer have to pretend. Your caresses leave me cold, as if I had been exposed to Arctic winds."
The challenge was given and quickly accepted. Hawk swore she was lying. Rozalyn may have deceived him with her soft-spoken professions of love, but her body had responded willingly. She had yearned to caress him and she had done so. Perhaps she did loathe the sight of him as she claimed, but she had enjoyed their lovemaking and he was not about to deny himself the pleasure of touching her. They would spend long months together. If he held himself at bay, that would drive him stark raving mad. Having her so close without taking her in his arms and losing himself in the softness of her feminine flesh would be pure torture.
"Again the choice is yours, Roz," he murmured. His hand began to flow across her hip to trace the silky smoothness of her thigh. "You can deny yourself the pleasure of passion if you wish, but I will not."
Before Rozalyn could protest, his mouth opened on hers, and his tongue traced her unresponsive lips until they parted beneath his warm, demanding kiss. Forbidden sensations trickled through Rozalyn's veins as Dominic's roaming hands discovered her sensitive points, though she chided herself for feeling anything but revulsion for this green-eyed devil. Hawk was crumbling every defense she'd sought to construct, doing it with persuasive gentleness.
Oh, why couldn't he be forceful with her! she thought. His fingertips swirled around each throbbing peak and then splayed across her abdomen. She could have hated him all the more if he had been rough and abusive, but she damned him and damned herself for responding.
Like tide waters rolling-against a sandy shore and then ebbing into the sea from which they came, Hawk withdrew his hands. Emerald eyes that flamed with barely contained passion bore into Rozalyn's as Hawk unstrapped his belt and shed his buckskin shirt. The muscles of his chest flexed and relaxed as he cast his garments aside and then rose to full stature, a faint smile skittering across his lips when he took up Rozalyn's hand and laid it over his thudding heart.
"You remember how hot the flames of love can burn, don't you, Roz? The passion between us is not easily contained. Your hatred doesn't change the way I feel when you touch me. We may have our differences, but some things never change, things like my need for you, my craving for your kiss and caress."
The velvety huskiness of his voice, the compelling sparkle in his eyes, made her hands move involuntarily. As if they had wills of their own, her fingertips swam across a sea of hair-roughened flesh, and she could not
I keep her eyes from wandering over his granite shoulders, the taut tendons of his arms. Hawk was ail male, hard, bronzed, and extremely attractive. Rozalyn hated to admit that she adored the feel of his rough flesh beneath her hand, that she thrilled to the way he stirred beneath her touch. She had always thought Dominic Baudelair handsome and charismatic, but he'd seemed slightly out of place in his fashionable velvet garments. Indeed, Rozalyn had considered him too much a man for the sophisticated fashions of aristocrats. Seeing him here in the wilderness, garbed in form-fitting buckskin she knew he was in his element. Hawk was a part of this vast, sprawling world beyond the Mississippi.
While her mind strayed she was falling into his seductive trap. Her hands were caressing the broad expanse of his chest, and her lips were brushing over his taut male nipples. Senses that had remained dormant for a week came awake, betraying her attempt not to feel, not to enjoy. This raven-haired devil could easily weave his spell about her if she did not guard her fragile heart that had just begun to mend.
Fool! He will only hurt you, her wounded pride said, just loudly enough to catch Rozalyn's attention before she was swept into arousing sensations. With the quickness of a striking cobra, she darted sideways and hurriedly scooped up Hawk's discarded clothes and his pistols. A stunned expression appeared on his craggy features when he found his own flintlock aimed at his chest.
Rozalyn's mouth curved upward in a devilish smile as she snatched up the horses' reins and then steadily backed away, leaving Hawk unarmed and unclad.
"Now it is your turn to portray Lady Godiva," Rozalyn taunted. Slowly she inched away, drawing the string of horses with her. Hawk deserved to be left naked like the beasts of the wild since he was one of them. His humiliation would be small consolation for the heart-wrenching pain he had put her through. "No doubt you will play your new role as effortlessly as you portrayed a doting lover."
"You would leave me here with no weapons of defense, no protection from inclement weather?" Hawk was incredulous.
Rozalyn's eyes flooded over his nude body. "It seems only fitting that the wolf who stalked about St. L
oui
s in sheep's clothing should be exposed for what he is."
"How far do you think you will get in the wilderness without running into trouble?" Hawk took a bold step forward, but when Rozalyn cocked the hammer of the flintlock, he stopped in his tracks. "This is hardly St. Lo
ui
s, minx. Unfriendly Indians and ruthless ruffians roam here. They will not grant you amnesty."
"I can take care of myself," Rozalyn insisted. Cautiously watching Hawk's every movement, she drew the buckskin shirt over her head and pushed it down over her hips. "You should be more concerned about your welfare."
As the buckskin shirt fell into place, Hawk noted the alluring picture Rozalyn presented. Lord, even the doehide garment could not disguise her beauty. The front of her shirt gaped to reveal the full swells of her breasts, and the long fringe on the garment's hem dangled sensuously upon her thighs. Hawk had hoped that attire would be less distracting than her provocative gown, but Mother Nature had been overly generous with Rozalyn. It was impossible to conceal her beauty, whether she was at her best or worst. How could he keep his lusty thoughts from running rampant when he looked at her? And worse, how could the rough-edged hunters who roamed the plains control themselves when they caught sight of this alluring minx?
He winced apprehensively when he noticed whereRozalyn's backward strides were about to lead her. "Have a care, nymph." Hawk inclined his raven head toward the hazard that lay a few feet behind her. "You will be up to your lovely neck in trouble if you don't watch where you step," he warned her.
Rozalyn flung Hawk a withering glance, annoyed by his attempt to distract her. She knew he was baiting her. If she dared to turn her head, he would pounce on her. "Don't expect me to fall for that trick," she declared sarcastically.
Broad shoulders lifted and then dropped in a lackadaisical shrug. "Ah, well, it was worth a try. But I should have known you were too clever to—"
His remark was cut off by Rozalyn's surprised squawk. Her foot had settled into ground that was not solid. Quicksand! She screamed in panic as she felt the slushy murk curl around her legs, frantically flapping her arms, as if she could sprout wings and fly to freedom. But feathered fowl she was not! The weight of the clothing, belts, and pistols she was carrying sent her deeper into the voracious sand, which pulled her downward.
Rozalyn had let go of the lead horse's reins when she'd been taken by surprise, and, startled, the animal had bolted to the side, leaving her with no means to drag herself from disaster. Now panic gripped her as quicksand oozed about her waist, and her wild eyes flew to the naked mountain man who was grinning with sadistic glee.
"Get me out of here!" Rozalyn screeched furiously. She was angry with herself for not heeding Hawk's warning and agitated with him for not being more persistent. Damn him! He was thoroughly enjoying the sight of her floundering in quicksand.
Hawk swaggered toward Rozalyn and carefully leaned out to relieve her of his clothes and supplies. When she stretched out her arm to grip his hand, he quickly withdrew it. Calmly, he stepped into his breeches. Then he simply stood and watched the quicksand mold itself to her shapely body.
Rozalyn sputtered in outrage. Hawk had every intention of letting her suffocate in the sand! He was going to stand there, watching in wicked satisfaction while she vanished from sight. The hard-hearted scoundrel! He was loving every minute of this.
"My father will never agree to your terms if you do not deliver me to the rendezvous," Rozalyn reminded him coldly, as the damp sand crept across her ribs.
"I have always prided myself on being resourceful," Hawk boasted. Then he flashed Rozalyn a haughty smile. "I'll think of something."
"Dammit, Hawk!" she fumed. "Give me your hand!"
He laughed. "Gladly . . . if only I could devise a way to detach it from the end of my arm."
Rozalyn was becoming more infuriated by the second. How dare he tease her when she was about to meet her maker. Did this mountain man have not one smidgen of compassion?
"If I save you from imminent death, will you promise to behave yourself in the future?" Hawk asked.
She put out her defiant chin, the only part of her anatomy that wasn't covered with quicksand, and the look she gave was tantamount to a spiteful curse that condemned his miserable soul to hell.
Hawk had no difficulty decoding her murderous glare. Chuckling, he turned his back on the stubborn vixen who was up to her neck in trouble. "Very well, you have made your choice. Being a gentleman, I will respect your decision."
She could not believe her eyes when he strode over to regather the scattered horses. "Murderer!" she shouted at him.
"Sticks and stones . . ." Hawk taunted wickedly. "I will not come to your rescue until you promise not to attempt another escape. You have already proven you cannot handle yourself in the wild, but I must commend you on your versatility. Not only can you dive headlong into disaster, you can back into it as well."
Rozalyn breathed a defeated sigh as the quicksand towed her farther into its dark depths. "I promise," she choked out begrudgingly. She wondered if those were to be her last words, for Hawk seemed to be in no rush to retrieve her.
After he had tethered the horses to a nearby tree he ambled back to the pool of quicksand. Bracing his legs, he crouched down to extend a helping hand, but just before Rozalyn could entwine her fingers in his, Hawk retracted his arm and grinned mischievously.
"There is another stipulation I neglected to make...."
Rozalyn was infuriated by his roguish grin. She knew full well what price he expected in return for his chivalry, if one could call it that. The lout! He wanted her to surrender to his lust after he had saved her life.
"You conniving bastard," she spat at him and then hastily closed her mouth before she swallowed quicksand.
The teasing smile that dangled on one side of Hawk's mouth evaporated. He squatted down on his haunches to meet Rozalyn's exasperated glower. "I am sure you believe that to be true—and perhaps it is. But that doesn't change what lies smoldering between us. I want you, Roz—and without a fight," he said simply.
Rozalyn would have burst into frustrated tears if she had not been so determined not to let this invincible mountain man see her cry. Straining her neck above the murk, she nodded her compliance. "Without a fight," she agreed submissively.
His firm hand folded around hers, dragging her from the bottomless pool of quicksand that had very nearly swallowed her up, and Rozalyn breathed a sigh of relief when his strong, competent arms went around her. Hawk held her until her legs no longer wobbled beneath her.