Wild Burn (26 page)

As his teeth closed in subtle warning around her nipple, he shoved his hands beneath her skirts, rough palms finding the expanse of thigh between her garters and the short drawers that had ridden up to snugly compress the cheeks of her arse as she straddled him. She wiggled at the feel of his palms sliding up, up to her hips, gripping her with bruising force as he guided her firmly against his erection.

They groaned in tandem as the hard ridge of his arousal rubbed none too gently along the hot, damp gusset of her knickers. His lips opened, and he drew her fully into his mouth, suckling her with desperate abandon. His hands urged her hips to roll against him, each shaking slide spiraling her deeper and deeper into the beckoning insanity she always felt in his arms. Unable to maintain even a semblance of composure, she clawed at his shoulders, his collar, his damned proper necktie until he released her throbbing breast and captured her panting mouth with his.

His kiss was hot, dominant and forceful, and it burned her up, from head to toe. She knew she was making sounds, knew her body was moving madly over his, but she couldn’t control her reactions. Not when he sucked her tongue between his lips, and certainly not when one of his hands found the slit in her drawers and, without warning, shoved two fingers inside her.

She froze, her spine stiff and shoulders contorted as he flexed his wrist to delve his fingers deeper into her. She broke out in a sweat when he tore his mouth from hers to bite down on her chin with a moan. “You’re so tight, Moira. So fucking wet and tight, and, God, I need to be in you. Now.”

His thumb found the pulsing nub at the top of her sex, and the sensations caused by the calloused digit caused her very bones to liquefy. She melted around him, using her hold on his loosened necktie to draw his mouth back to hers, and she kissed him hungrily. Her eyelids were heavy, her mind blurred with the rush of quivering lust, and as his other hand moved beneath her skirts to fumble with the placket of his trousers, she trembled violently. “Yes, that, please.” She knew what was coming, would die if she didn’t have him in her.

The fingers inside her stroked and manipulated her, drawing her closer and closer to the edge of blissful oblivion until they disappeared, and she whined in protest. “No—”

But then the head of his cock was there, blunt and satiny, and her mouth watered and her limbs burned. “Take it. Take me.” Both of his hands returned to her hips under her skirt and pulled her down over him.

She sobbed as he entered her, inch by thick, excruciating inch, and she felt the tremors start, blooming from the base of her spine to whip through her bloodstream. She clenched around him as the roaring in her ears deafened her, sliding down his length until she was filled, completely filled with him.

Her head lolled back, but he commanded her attention. “Look at me.” She blinked at his stern, rugged, beautiful face as he thrust into her. “You’re not done,” he growled, snapping his hips. The thick glide of him, reaching so far inside her, sent a fresh round of spasms snaking down to coil and curve around his invasion. “Ride me,” he demanded.

He showed her how, with the sinful pressure of his fingers, splayed over her hips and arse. The uncomfortable plank of the wagon seat bit into her stockinged knees, but she didn’t care. The creak of wood against wood, the impatient stamping of horses’ hooves, the aggravated sound of his breathing—every element added to the slick, growing pressure of need rising like an overzealous tide inside her once again. She stared into his eyes, watching the black pupils dilate until the barest ring of pale jade remained, seeing the ruddy, uneven flush of passion color his cheeks, and her pace quickened.

She raced selfishly toward another peak, but her lover didn’t mind. Shifting his hold on her, he settled a fingertip against her clitoris. Several teasing flicks had her at the precipice, but it was his own groan, his broken confession of, “I’m gonna come. Fuck, I’m gonna come, Moira,” that sent her hurtling over the edge into back-bowing pleasure. She cried out, scrabbling to hold on to him as he jetted helplessly inside her.

Burying his face in her neck, he shuddered in the aftermath. His hands squeezed her hips, ensuring their connection remain unsevered, but, eventually, as she started to feel the cool air chilling her damp skin, he withdrew and wrapped his arms around her. Her own loosely circled his neck, her cheek resting against his sweat-tangled hair, and he started to press small, soothing kisses against her throat.

She swallowed, and his lips found her slowing pulse, rested there as he breathed in a deep lungful of air. His fully clothed chest expanded against her mostly bared one, and she realized wryly that, once again, he hadn’t taken his pants off.

The thought seemed to occur to him at the same time, and he huffed out a soft laugh into her shoulder before lifting his head. “Not how I planned our second time together,” he murmured, reaching up to tuck a strand of hair behind her uninjured ear before stroking a warm thumb over her cheekbone.

She wanted to smile at him but found she couldn’t. Her levity had inexplicably gone on holiday the moment he’d tenderly touched her face. She just stared at him, wide eyed and unblinking.

He sobered as he took in her expression, gently settling her off him and onto the bench seat once more. He tugged at her blouse and jacket, covering her with the few functioning buttons that had survived his frenzy, then twisted to grab their hats and her shawl from the back of the wagon. Bending to retrieve her reticule, which had fallen to the footboard, he hefted it in his hand. “What do you have in here, rocks?” he teased, obvious nerves making his half smile rather wooden.

She took the bag from him. “My gun.”

That silenced him. Gathering up the reins, he freed the brake and set the horses moving forward down the road, away from the innocuous scene of their passion. He didn’t say a word during the remainder of their trek back to Red Creek, but she sensed him sneaking glances at her.

She wrapped her shawl more tightly around her shoulders, crossing the ends over her torso in an effort to cover the damage to her clothing. She didn’t mind one bit that she now looked as ruined as she was in actuality, and she longed to reassure him that she wasn’t upset, that she loved what happened between them in the middle of the open road.

It was just that she was…stunned. She hadn’t realized…but how could she have? She’d enjoyed herself on Saturday when he had made love to her in her cabin. She had found release in his arms, and it had been lovely.

But this was…this was something else entirely. This was consuming and agonizing, untamed and glorious and terrifying. Moira had lost her mind, her sense, her control—all to the fiery passion of Delaney’s possession. And she didn’t care. She didn’t care
,
just wanted—
needed
—it to happen again.

Her hands shook in her lap, and her lips twitched of their own accord. Well, maybe they could wait awhile before they went another round, if only so she could balance herself before he toppled her like a tower of bricks once more. The fall was so much better that way.

Before long, he was halting the wagon near her cabin door, hopping down with a graceful economy of movement she admired to assist her descent. His large hands gripped her waist, and he very purposefully slid her down the front of his body as her toes touched the ground, letting her feel the firm muscles roping his abdomen, the ridges of which her fingers wished to explore. He was aroused again too, and that hardness set off an answering spasm in her still-sensitized core. Before she could think better of it, and knowing it was what they both wanted, she said, “Come inside.”

“I don’t think—”

“Come inside, Delaney.” She tempered her order with a smile, watching some of the tension drain from his shoulders.

His head dipped slightly. “I need to return the wagon to the livery, but then I’ll be back.” He leaned in, brushing his mouth lightly over lips still swollen from his earlier assault. “It’s broad daylight, honey.”

Pretending not to understand, she tipped her head back to glance up at the sky. “Oh, I don’t know. It looks fairly overcast to me.” Her hands came to rest on his chest, and she found she could grin up at him. “But you should probably hurry, just in case the sun comes out.”

Chuckling, he dipped his head, this time coaxing her lips apart with leisurely passes of his tongue. She liked these kisses and the easy, languorous manner in which they stoked her desire. It wasn’t a flash flood, but instead a tripping brook, and she found comfort in the different paths Del took to lead her toward pleasure.

Her hands smoothed over the expanse of his waistcoat as she leaned into him, reaching for his solid ribs where he’d marked himself with the remnants of his past. He shifted, drawing her closer, and something hard knocked against her knuckles.

Curious, she broke the kiss as her hand ran over the inside of his coat front. Just when she found the hidden pocket and her fingers curled around her discovery, his hand shot out and stilled her wrist. “Moira, no…”

She pulled out the small, square box covered in royal blue velvet and stared at it as it rested in her palm. Her thumbnail found the seam, toyed with it, and she looked up at him. His face was stoic, his expression grim, and when she flipped open the lid, his eyes closed briefly.

The ring inside was gorgeous, glittering and not even remotely modest. It must have cost him a small fortune, and she opened her mouth to tell him so, a surge of adrenaline fuzzing her mind as she realized what this meant, but he beat her to it. “It’s yours. And if you’re wondering how I paid for it, you should know that I…I inherited some money when my father died. Never touched it ’til now, though, because the only thing I could imagine spending it on is you.” The words left him in a gravelly torrent, and when he paused, he looked embarrassed. “I had a plan.”

“A plan?” Her voice was hoarse as her gaze slid back to the magnificent ring.

“Proposing to you. I had a plan.”

“What happened to the plan?”

His smile was tinged with frustrated amusement. “You found the ring box.”

Oh. Right. “This isn’t because I slept with you, is it? Because I don’t need—”

He stopped her with a hand lifted to her cheek. “I do. I need.” He sucked in a breath, and she was trapped by the intoxicating gleam in his eyes, so much more brilliant than the ring in her hand. “Moira, I—”

“Crawford!” John White Horse’s shout broke them apart, and Del and Moira turned to see the younger man racing down the rocky slope. “Crawford, it’s Matthews and Nelson. They’re burning the tribe!”

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Together, Del and John ran to the encampment.

After ordering Moira to stay put, Del sprinted up the hill, shoulder to shoulder with John as they dashed through the forest. The new clothes weren’t as worn-in as his typical attire, and he felt the tug and pull of stiff fabric impeding his movements as his stride lengthened. Tree branches slapped at his face and arms, and, ducking down, he lost his hat.

There was no time to retrieve it as, heart pounding and chest heaving, he burst into the clearing. “What happened?”

John’s black hair whipped back from his head in a streaming tail as he ran. “I went to see my uncle, and the flames had already taken half the homes. I tried to help everyone move, but when we started fighting the fire, Nelson and Matthews and a handful of miners appeared with rifles and torches.”

“How did you get away?” They broke through the other side of the clearing. Del grabbed his gun from its holster, checking the chamber for rounds. He only had the six, but it would have to be enough.

“I was at the creek, getting water. I came up behind them.”

He shot John a disbelieving glance, swatting away a thin branch as it stung his cheek. “And you decided to run instead of fight? I don’t buy it.”

John palmed two long, evil-looking knives and glared back at him. “It is one thing for a white man to kill Indians. It is another thing entirely for me to kill white men.”

The smell of smoke hit Del’s nostrils, sending him spinning back to last November, when the acrid scent of burning wool and the stench of scorched flesh nearly caused him to lose the contents of his stomach. It affected him in exactly the same way now, except instead of abject horror, he felt rage.

The truth of John’s statement couldn’t be denied, as unjust as it was. If John had sunk any arrows into Matthews or sliced any arteries on Nelson, he would have hanged. As hard as he’d worked to become a part of the white world, John was Cheyenne, and he always would be. Somehow during the melee, he’d kept a cool head long enough to realize he was more good to his people alive than dangling in the wind, and Del had to commend him for that.

Then he remembered. “The children?” Moira would be devastated if they were harmed, and he was reminded of earlier that afternoon, when she’d vehemently argued with Hood in Del’s defense.
Because then you’d just find someone else to do it, and perhaps that person wouldn’t be quite so discriminating.

Heaven help Matthews if he’d hurt any of those children.

“Hiding,” came John’s reply, slowing as they approached the encampment.

Thick clouds of gray-black smoke wafted over the scrubby bushes, twining around the sparse greenery on some of the lower-hanging tree branches. Masculine shouts, indecipherable and angry, carried over the more chilling sounds of terrified women.

That person wouldn’t be quite so discriminating.
“We’ll stop ’em, John.”

John nodded, and together they made the silent decision to split, Del veering to the right while John circled around to the rear of the camp, where most of the burning had occurred. No one would hear Del’s approach, and he used that to his advantage as he moved up behind the first torch-wielding miner. Flipping the gun in his hand until he gripped the barrel, Del used the weapon as a cudgel and knocked the miner unconscious with a swift, near-silent blow to the back of his skull.

A few yards beyond, Del could see the women and old men of the tribe, corralled by four miners, all bearing cocked rifles. Nelson stood to the side, his Henry aimed at two younger braves and the chief. Walking Bear had his hands raised and was saying something, not that Del could make it out from where he was. Every time one of the women moved or whimpered, the men surrounding them would yell obscenities and inch their guns closer to the captives.