Savage Hero (15 page)

He gave her a soft smile, then looked at his people again. “She will return soon, for there will be a wedding celebration . . .
ours
,” he announced.

He had hoped to see understanding in his people's eyes. He found it, and even approval in some. He had explained himself well in council and asked the warriors to take the message of his love for this white woman back to their lodges.

If anyone resented his decision, his choice, it did not show tonight in anyone's eyes.

Breaking the horse had been a deliberate move. He'd wanted to give his people something more to think about than their chief's announcement that he wanted a white woman to be his wife.

“Go now, my people,” he said. “The night is new. I shall join you soon to share in the feasting and singing.”

They all went back into the village.

Brave Wolf placed his hands at Mary Beth's waist and drew her closer. “You have been accepted,” he said proudly. “Soon we
will
be man and wife.”

He lowered his lips to hers.

She twined her arms around his neck and returned his kiss.

If David was with her, safe, ah, life would have been beautiful and perfect.

As they stepped away from each other, Brave Wolf laughed huskily. He reached a hand to her face and used his thumb to brush away some red paint that had smeared from his face to hers.

She saw the paint on his thumb, laughed, then placed a finger on his painted face. “No paint could ever hide your handsomeness,” she murmured.

If he asked whether she was ready to make love with him, she was more than ready. Her whole soul ached for it.

Suddenly Mary Beth was startled out of Brave Wolf's arms by a chorus of coyote yelps from a nearby butte.

Brave Wolf sensed her fear and drew her close again. “You must learn to accept the coyote as a part of our lives,” he said. “You see, the coyote is more intelligent than man. Coyotes will still be around when men have killed off all the other animals. They might even outlive man. They are everywhere.”

“Do they ever come into the village?” Mary Beth asked warily.

“Very rarely do they venture too close,” Brave Wolf said, again listening to the coyotes' songs. “They fear man even more than man fears them.”

The song and laughter of his people wafted through the air, touching Mary Beth's soul.

“Let us talk no more about coyotes,” she said. “I would love to join your people's fun. I feel so comfortable with them now.”

“As they do you,” Brave Wolf said, taking
Midnight's reins and leading him toward the village. “Tomorrow is not far away, so let us fully enjoy the night.”

The huskiness in his voice made Mary Beth blush, for she knew that he was not only talking of fun with his people. He had read her well—he knew what was in her heart.

Yes, soon they would be floating amid the stars as they found a wondrous love in each other's arms.

When they reached the huge outdoor fire where the crowd was now assembled on blankets, eating, talking, and laughing, a young brave took Midnight to Brave Wolf's corral.

Dancing Butterfly ran up to Mary Beth. All smiles, she gave Mary Beth a tray of food, which included the pemmican meatballs Mary Beth had helped prepare.

“It is such a wonderful night,” Dancing Butterfly said, her gaze darting to Pure Heart's lodge.

Mary Beth saw why Dancing Butterfly was so radiantly happy. Night Horse lay just outside the tepee, his eyes no longer glazed with fever. He was on his way to a full recovery, and his gaze was on Dancing Butterfly.

Brave Wolf noticed the two looking at each other. He was not happy about that.

When he made Night Horse leave, what would happen to Dancing Butterfly? He knew that she loved Night Horse.

He feared for her now, feared that her love for
Night Horse might lead her into making the wrong decision, one that she would regret for the rest of her life. She was too sweet to allow someone like Night Horse to dictate her future.

Out of the Indian approach to life
came a great freedom, an intense and
absorbing love for nature; a respect
for life.

—Luther Standing Bear,
Oglala Sioux Chief

“I truly enjoyed the evening,” Mary Beth said as she went into Brave Wolf's tepee with him. “And I never felt as though I were an intruder. I felt that most everyone accepted me.”

Brave Wolf took her by the hand and pulled her down onto the thick pelts beside the slow-burning lodge fire. “They see you as their chief's woman. That is why they did nothing to make you feel uncomfortable,” he said. “Can you feel it, as well? Can you feel our connection?”

“I do, and I felt it even before I would admit to myself that I could trust you and the goodness I saw in you,” Mary Beth murmured. “What had just happened in my life was so horrible. How could I immediately trust a man who resembled those who took so much from me?”

“I cannot restore your losses, except perhaps, your son,” Brave Wolf said thickly. “I am sorry that my warriors' search for David has not been successful.” He placed his hands at her waist and drew her closer. “If the pony soldiers can do what my warriors have not been able to do, that will be good. I want nothing but your happiness.”

“I do not look forward to going to Fort Henry,” Mary Beth said. “At first, that was all I could think about . . . going to be with my own people. Now I cannot see any future that does not include you.”

She placed a hand on his cheek. “How can love come so quickly between a man and a woman?” she asked softly. “Since I have never truly loved before, it all seems like such a miracle. I can hardly believe that I found it now . . . that I fell in love with you so quickly, a stranger until only a few days ago . . . a man who is not of my own people . . . a man most white women would fear.”

She sighed. “I never feared you,” she said. “Never. You did not put fear into my heart . . . only sweetness.”

“You did not feel anything like sweetness at first,” he said, chuckling. “If you did, you were good at pretending you hated me.”

“Hate was not the emotion that I felt,” she said,
smiling almost shyly. “Frustration that I could not get you to do as I asked . . . but not hate. I felt something special for you very soon after you rescued me, but I would not admit it, even to myself.”

“That was then, this is now, and all is good between us,” Brave Wolf said thickly. “I am a man in love. You are a woman who loves. Let us not wonder why. Let us just accept our good fortune with warmth in our hearts. Let us enjoy it.”

“And by enjoy, you do mean something more than hugging one another,” Mary Beth said, blushing.

No man had ever awakened this new side of herself. She actually felt sensual . . . seductive. Her body cried out for something from this man.

She wanted to experience true lovemaking.

When she had made love with her husband, she had pretended that she had received pleasure from it, when in truth her body had never been awakened to the miracle of love . . . of sensuality.

Just being with Brave Wolf had aroused these feelings in her. To think that she might experience the complete fulfillment that came with lovemaking made her whole insides tremble with anticipation.

Brave Wolf did not respond verbally. His answer was in the dark, deep passion in his eyes, and in the way his fingers trembled as he placed them at the hem of her doeskin dress and slowly began lifting it.

The mere touch of the dress moving along her flesh caused Mary Beth to melt. With each inch as
more and more of her body was revealed to Brave Wolf's watchful eyes.

Her heart pounded and she blushed anew when Brave Wolf slid the dress past her breasts, their dark tips tight as the air touched their bareness.

Then she sucked in a wild breath of ecstasy when he dipped his head low and flicked his tongue across one of her nipples. He continued to slide the dress slowly upward, and then over her head, tossing it to the floor behind him.

He brought his hands to her breasts and filled them with their heaviness, his lips now sucking on a nipple.

Mary Beth threw her head back in total ecstasy as Brave Wolf showered both breasts with electrifying kisses, then brought his lips to hers and gave her a deep, long, passionate kiss. At the same time, he pressed his body against hers, until she was on her back on the pelts.

Brave Wolf kissed her for a moment longer, then rose over her and removed his own clothes. When he was as naked as she, Mary Beth saw just how gifted a man he was.

She gazed at his maleness, then brazenly reached a hand to him and touched him. His eyes glazed over with rapture as she ran her fingers slowly up and down the full length of his shaft.

She remembered well how her husband had enjoyed such touches. He had seemed to enjoy her stroking more than the actual lovemaking.

She had been happy about that, since she had never looked forward to the bedtime duties of a
wife. She had been glad when her touch had satisfied him enough that he asked no more of her once his seed splashed out into her hand. That was another reason why they had never had a second child.

Now she wanted to make babies with this wonderful man. She wanted to share the sensual side of making babies with him.

“
Mitawin
, my woman, I want more than touches from you,” Brave Wolf said, taking her hand away, and seeming to have read her thoughts. “I want you . . .
all
of you. I want to fill you. I want you to feel me fill you.”

“I have never wanted a man like I want . . . like I
need
you,” Mary Beth said, then sucked in another wild breath when he ran his hand down the front of her, then touched that part of her between her thighs that had never responded to a man before.

She closed her eyes in ecstasy when he began slowly caressing her there.

“It . . . is . . . so heavenly . . .” she murmured breathlessly.

He smiled, lowered his lips to hers, and kissed her with fierce, possessive heat. His knee eased her legs apart.

With his hand he guided himself to where his fingers had just been, and without hesitation, entered her in one deep thrust.

Feeling her inner folds enwrapping his heat, Brave Wolf groaned with pleasure.

He laid his cheek against hers, closed his eyes, and began rhythmically moving within her.

Mary Beth wrapped her arms around his neck
and clung to him, her body seeming to know how to move with his.

Oh, Lord, this time she didn't have to pretend to feel the bliss that came with lovemaking.

It was real, so very, very intensely, beautifully real.

She smiled and moved with him, giving all that she could.

It came so easily to her, as though she was practiced at it, but in truth, she was learning everything tonight.

And she was so glad that she
was
feeling these wonderful things. Had she never known such bliss, she would have felt cheated when she grew into an old woman looking back on her life.

Now, ah, now she would never feel cheated.

As Brave Wolf's lean, sinewy buttocks moved, his heat filling her magnificently, Mary Beth was flooded with more wondrous rushes of bliss.

“I never knew it could be this way,” she whispered against his cheek, her voice catching when he went deeper into her, touching a place that aroused an even more delicious sensation within her.

He puzzled over what she had said.

More than once she had mentioned having not known such pleasure before.

She had had a husband!

Had her husband only selfishly satisfied his own needs, ignoring hers?

He would not question her about this. It could be humiliating for her to have to say it.

“My goal is to give you more pleasure than I take for myself,” he whispered huskily, his thrusts continuing.

“But I want you to feel it, too,” Mary Beth said, as he leaned up away from her to look into her eyes. “How can you not? Aren't I desirable enough to make you feel the pleasure that I am feeling?”

“Desirable?” he said, his eyes dancing. “My woman, you are so desirable I can take pleasure just by looking at you.” He smiled almost devilishly. “My woman, do not think I am not feeling all the wonder of how your body responds to mine. My body is alive with you.”

He pressed his lips against hers and gave her a sweet kiss as he swept a hand between them and cupped one of her breasts. “You fill my very soul with your sweetness,” he whispered against her lips.

“You are sweeter,” she whispered back, then melted as they came to that place where they both soared in passion's embrace . . . then lay together, still clinging, their hearts now beating as one.

“Never, oh, never will I forget this night, these special moments with you,” Mary Beth said, her cheeks flushed from the heat of their lovemaking. She turned over onto her belly and gazed into his eyes. “I shall love you always, my wonderful, handsome Crow chief.”

“For as long as there is breath in my lungs, I shall love you,” he said, reaching out for her, drawing her down beside him again.

Sighing contentedly, she cuddled against him as
she gazed at the dancing flames of the fire. “I wish there was nothing else but now, forever and ever,” she murmured.

Then she winced when she realized what she had just said.

Her son.

She could not want only moments like this forever, for that would mean she would not be with her son ever again.

She hurried to a sitting position. She was not even uneasy about sitting there naked as his eyes roamed slowly over her.

“You are thinking again of your son?” Brave Wolf said, sitting up, himself. He reached for her, placed his hands at her waist, then lifted her onto his lap, facing him. “Tomorrow comes soon, my woman. I know what tomorrow brings. We must be separated for a while, and I understand why. Your son. You must then focus only on him.”

“Yes, on finding him,” she said. She swallowed hard. Her eyes wavered. “What if he isn't . . . ?”