“Leave Lydia out of this,” Ned said gruffly. “She didn’t know anything about it. I stumbled onto it myself. One of her customers cut me in on the deal. I’ll tell you where the plates are. You retrieve them and leave Lydia out of it.”
“Who’s your partner?” Deacon asked.
“Not partner,” Ned corrected. “Boss. I’m no more than one of his flunkies who just happens to know what he’s into because I did a little detective work of my own.”
“So why not tell all instead of one drib at a time?” Miri asked impatiently.
“I’m not a complete fool. After you get the plates and turn me in, I’ll need something to bargain with when I’m dealing with the law.”
He looked around and grimaced at the wheelbarrow against the barn wall. “Meanwhile, after due consideration, this place suits me better than Eclipse.”
Ned appeared awfully agreeable. But tracking him again wasn’t something she wanted to do. In her opinion, Ned was crooked as a dog’s hind leg and had no sense of shame or remorse for those he’d wronged. Prison was a good place for him.
Miri doubted he’d even be prosecuted. He had one of those
trust me
faces people gravitated toward. His expression was guileless and accommodating by turns. He didn’t look like a thief or a criminal.
“And the plates are—?”
“Wrapped up in memories in the attic of the Pleasure Dome,” Ned answered quickly.
“Time to be on our way,” Deacon said and, as if on cue, Sam led their horses into the ranch yard and mounted his big appaloosa stud.
Miri climbed on Possum and rode between Sam and Deacon. Neither Charlie Wolf nor Ketchum was in sight. Miri worried about Ketchum’s earlier behavior. But she was certain that wherever Ketchum was, Charlie wasn’t far behind. He’d declared Ketchum part of the McCallister force. The Indians weren’t to touch him or they’d have a fight on their hands with the bounty hunters. Unfortunately, Miri couldn’t vouch for Ketchum’s cooperation.
She’d be glad to get off Hawks Nest land. On the ride in, until Ketchum’s altercation, she hadn’t paid much attention to the shadow riders watching them. But on their trip out of the ranch, it was different.
More than one Indian rider took the opportunity to break cover and show himself to them. At first, she thought it was a threat or warning. But then she began to get the awful sense that the men were, in some oblique fashion, introducing themselves to her.
She didn’t mention it but when they rode through the gate at the Hawks Nest entrance, Sam drawled, “Guess you’re going to have some competition, Deak. Better get your ponies lined up and your presents ready.”
She knew she hadn’t broken character on Hawks Nest ranch. She knew her disguise had been in place. But it seemed as though she might as well have a sign slapped on her head wearing “female” written in bold letters.
Charlie Wolf joined them with Ketchum loping along beside, waiting until they were distanced from the other ranch before he explained.
“You’ve got some admirers you beat when you were a kid. A couple of them are going to challenge you to fight ’em now that you’re full grown.”
“I’ve got no quarrel with them.” Rats. She’d lived with a Kiowa tribe for more than a year when she was traveling. They’d been moving through Tennessee and Louisiana and she’d tagged along. Then, as now, she’d spent her time with the young bucks, not the squaws. She didn’t want to fight any of them and said so.
“They don’t want to fight you because they’re mad. They figure if they can beat you in a match, you might consider them when you choose a
shikaa
.” Miri gaped at Charlie when he said the Kiowa word for husband.
“She’s already chosen,” Deacon spoke up.
Miri opened her mouth to disagree, or at least add some words to the discussion since it was about her. But Deacon no sooner declared her taken than the three men surrounded her, herding her toward the MC3.
She might have been able to out-talk or out-maneuver one of them, but all of the McCallisters working together toward one goal was more than she could handle. She’d thought maybe she’d get a chance to say a few words privately to Deacon before she headed to Eclipse. It appeared he’d already made other plans—and her going to Eclipse wasn’t part of them.
Then she dallied with the idea that they might get a chance to couple again before she left for town. That had her thighs clenching around the saddle and anticipation making her female juices flow. She didn’t want to be unseemly but if she could have hurried the others along toward the ranch, she would have.
Deacon wasn’t letting her out of his sight. Instead of the balm of reason he reached for, he pictured Miri facing the ring of Hawks Nest ranch hands with a knife in her hand. Then he reminded himself there were Kiowa ranch hands who intended to court her. He wanted to beat his chest and roar challenges at the Indian men who coveted
his
woman.
She’s not yours yet.
The practical yet sane part of his brain studied her ass as it shifted in the saddle in front of him.
She wants you.
The idea made his cock swell ever bigger and grind painfully against the unforgiving leather of the saddle seat.
Everything, including the counterfeiter business, was suspended until he solidified his claim. He was so filled with lust there wasn’t any room in his chest for air. He pictured mounting her and had to stifle a groan.
The knowledge of other men who’d discovered Miri unleashed a primitive desire to drag her into a cave and barricade it so that no one could interfere with his mating. The stark reality was—he didn’t have a cave. He had a bedroom on the second floor of the ranch house and five adults in rooms close enough to hear anything that went on within his walls.
He knew this because he had to listen to his brother and cousin coupling with their wives at night and pretend he was deaf at breakfast the next morning. Feverishly he tried to think of places he could take Miri. The old cabin he’d inherited from Annie sat on the other side of town and probably had spiders and jackrabbits living in it. He was humiliated by his lack. He didn’t deserve to have a woman to care for.
From the front gate to the ranch yard was the shortest long ride he’d ever been on. He measured every step of the trip and yet had no memory of it at all. When they pulled up in front of the barn, Deacon still had no place to be alone with her.
It was decidedly awkward. Sam didn’t bother to hide his grin as he dismounted and led his horse into the barn. Charlie was more helpful.
“Watch out for snakes.” His cousin threw him a blanket before riding into the barn, leaving Deacon and Miri still mounted and facing each other. While he was struggling to find the right words to get from looking to fucking, she took matters into her hands.
“You got a place to unfurl that ground cloth, Deacon? I’ve a mind to get naked with you again.”
If, want
and
maybe
changed to
where
in a moment. Passion flared between them and it was all Deacon could do to keep from falling with her to the ground in a frenzy of passion. Looking at the blanket Charlie had thrown him, Deacon suddenly knew exactly where they could go.
His mouth was too dry to speak. He lifted her from her saddle and had her stationed in front of him on his lap before she finished gasping in surprise.
“Mind my animals for me,” Miri called to Charlie as he reemerged from the barn. She was laughing like a fool and clinging to Deacon as he rode from the ranch yard carrying her in his arms. Evidently as needy as he was, Miri’s long slender fingers nimbly unbuttoned his shirt.
Don’t let me come across like a slavering animal. I’ve got to be easy with her. She’s young, tender, innocent…
When she slid her hands up his chest, pressing her thumbs against his nipples, he groaned. When she touched her tongue against the right nub, he had to clamp his jaws shut to keep from howling like a beast.
She laughed, the low husky sound brushing across his senses like a mist of kerosene on flames. He jerked under the caress. He couldn’t get through her top layers so he went straight for the gold. Shoving his hand into her buckskins, he breached her nether lips, his fingers greeted by her wet heat.
“Fuck easy,” he growled.
She didn’t pretend shy. She opened her legs for him and nipped her way up his torso until she was nibbling on his neck and clenching her pussy around the finger he slid inside. As they splashed across the stream, she thrust upward and he gave her two fingers to squeeze.
He was little better than a crazed beast when he pulled up and dismounted, taking them both to the ground, him on top. She didn’t protest, and the way she wrapped her legs around his waist and rocked her pussy against his cock indicated that she was ready for the ride he had planned.
He got the blanket laid and her buckskins past her rump but he didn’t get her moccasins or his pants and boots off the first time. She was needy too. She made mewling noises of want and he opened the front of his pants, shoved her buckskins past her thighs and rolled her to her knees, thrusting into her from behind.
Deacon went from desperation to sublime pleasure in one motion as he sank into her wet heat. He followed her hip-swiveling dance, pumping into her as the walls of her channel massaged his cock. He grabbed her hat and pulled it off. She dragged the brown wig off as well.
She had a kerchief tied around her head. He shortened his thrusts, leaning over her back to nuzzle her neck and remove the handkerchief too. Once free, her hair cascaded damply around her shoulders. He wound his hand into the thick mane and pulled her head back and up, forcing her torso into an arch as he held her hips with his other hand and took her with jarring thrusts.
When he felt the coiling power of his orgasm building in his spine and tingling in his toes, he pulled out in time to spill his seed on her rump, relishing the way the white cream looked against the rosy flush of her round bottom.
“Uh, that was—”
“Openers,” Deacon growled. He didn’t know what she thought
it
had been.
It
wasn’t over. He grabbed his shirttail and wiped his emissions from her rear before baring her.
Flipping her onto her back, he lifted her legs over his shoulders and buried his face between her thighs. She clenched and shuddered under each stroke of his tongue.
“Deacon,” she gasped. “That’s not right—”
“Right as God,” he lifted his head and disagreed. Then he returned to heaven, centering his lips and sucking on the button of nerves at her apex.
Deacon didn’t know the flavor of ambrosia but the taste couldn’t be any more heavenly than the honey he licked from her folds. He savored her flesh, tonguing the inner shell of her cleft before sinking two fingers into her channel.
“Well, maybe it is,” she moaned, arching her pelvis into the primitive caress as her orgasm pulsed. He replaced his fingers with his tongue, lapping up the new flood of emissions and pushing her into another release.
When she was pliant, satiated and lolling in his grip, he set her hips to the blanket and fit himself between her thighs.
“Deacon?” she panted, her look almost timid as he thrust into her.
“Don’t make me stop,” he groaned, slowing down and trying to grab control. He’d been in lust for Beauregard for a long time without admitting it. He needed this, needed her.
“I’m not telling you to quit,” she answered, her tone cross. “But if’n you could see your way clear to smoothing the rocks out from under me, I’d be a lot happier.”
Deacon rolled over, carrying her with him and letting her take top position. Her hair caught the last rays of the day’s sun and glistened like spun silk hanging over her shoulders.
“Dear God, you’re beautiful,” he growled.
“Hush telling such tall stories. It’s enough you want to couple with me.” She pressed her fingers against his lips.
He nipped her fingers, then pulled her close to suckle her breast. She shivered under his wet caress and he attended the other nipple, recognizing the flush of red spreading on her chest as the precursor to another orgasm.
“Ride me, sweetheart. Let me see your pleasure when you come.”
Her eyes sparkled and her hips swayed. She rotated her mound, grinding the lips of her sex against his groin and taking him deeper with each of her thrusts.
Her cunny clenched around his cock, stroking his flesh until Deacon also teetered on the precipice of release. Her husky laugh told him she knew his orgasm neared.
“Come with me,” he ordered her.
“Bossy, aren’t you, McCallister?” she asked, laughing down at him, and then went over the moon with him, screaming her pleasure at the end.
It was late afternoon when they’d crossed the stream. They didn’t collapse on the blanket in each other’s arms until the moon was high overhead. She was naked. So was he. Any snakes on the tiny slip of land forming an island must have fled under the assault of their passion.
Nothing but the sound of cicadas singing in the trees interrupted the night. She shivered and, remembering how she’d been chilled at the Pleasure Dome, he grabbed his shirt and pulled it across them, blanketing her with another layer of him.
He laughed self-consciously, aware of his cock rousing, already preparing for another foray although they’d fucked steadily since afternoon. “You ready to talk?” he asked.