by Debra Dixon
“I’m not quite as patient as you,” Niki apologized as she opened his zipper unceremoniously.
She enjoyed his quick intake of breath as she slipped her hands inside to caress his warm flesh. The pulse of his excitement beat beneath her fingers. She reveled in the feel of satin-covered steel and pushed his pants open impatiently. His shaft slid sensuously through her palms as she let her tongue taste his chest and swirl a circle around his nipple.
“Easy, Cookie,” Zach murmured, dragging her hands upward to cradle them in his. He placed a kiss in her palm and drew her to him.
Without warning, he scooped her up and placed her on his opened sleeping bag. In a second he rid himself of his clothing and joined her, pulling her beneath him and lowering his lips to hers. Zach let his hands roam over her body, teasing her legs open, drawing spirals on her belly with his fingertips. He kissed and played with her and let his fingers prepare her for him.
When Niki’s hips began rising to meet the rhythm of his manipulation, Zach knew with deep certainty that she wanted him as much as he wanted her. The throb of his arousal was creating a need that would not be denied. Niki’s body opened to welcome him, and an uneven sigh escaped her lips as he entered.
Nothing about Zach’s lovemaking was hurried, and the slow, sensual stroke of his arousal as he thrust inside her was the most erotic touch Niki had ever known. Time and again, she felt the quicksilver stirring of pleasure as Zach expertly brought them to the edge of passion and then retreated.
“Look at me, Niki,” he ordered softly as he stroked deep inside her.
Niki’s eyes opened slowly. She felt protected and devoured all at once. The impact of the raw desire reflected in his eyes sent heat spiraling through her. His gaze held hers as he brought them to the edge, and this time he sent them spinning over.
Yesterday Zach had been halfway to being in love with Niki. Now he knew he’d vaulted his own barbed-wire fence as surely as Brass had vaulted his. He was in love with a woman who had reason to hate everything he wanted: Wyoming, public life, Cutter’s Creek.
Their climax had shaken him right down to his soul. Afterward they had clung to each other, not saying a word, afraid to break the spell of contentment that surrounded them. Zach pulled her sleeping bag over them, cradled Niki in his arms, and closed his eyes. An hour later they were still awake. The deep quiet of the night was a palpable presence. Silence hummed in their ears.
“You should be asleep,” Zach whispered the words into the curve of Niki’s neck. His hand rested intimately on her abdomen. Possessively. She was his whether she knew it or not.
“I can’t sleep with all this quiet.”
Zach doubted the quiet was responsible for Niki’s insomnia, but he kept his opinion to himself. He had a pretty good idea of exactly how confused she must be over what had happened between them tonight. Two people who’d known each other for such a short time had absolutely no business being so damn good at loving each other.
“Niki, either go to sleep or talk to me. This silence is driving me crazy too.”
She adjusted her head so she could look up into his face, a mischievous glint in her eyes. “Are those my only choices? Talking or sleeping?”
Chuckling, Zach moved his hand lower. “There is, of course, a third option.”
Niki intercepted his hand and searched his face, wanting to tell him how special he made her feel. Wanting to be sure he understood that she didn’t jump into bed with men she’d only known five days. Normally, she didn’t jump into bed with men she’d known five months, five years. “Zach, I usually don’t … I mean—”
“Shh, don’t say it, Cookie,” he told her, dropping a kiss on her lips. “I know you don’t.”
Zach shifted abruptly, turning her in his arms so that he could stare down into her face. His voice hardened, and his words were unmistakably serious. “And that worries me. Women who don’t usually aren’t on the pill. Cookie, you got me so damned crazy, I didn’t think about protecting you. There may be consequences.”
Niki hoped the darkness masked the color she could feel rising to her cheeks. Heaven help her, he was right. All she’d cared about was the texture of his body against hers, the sweet release of the desire she’d had bottled up for so long.
No, she wasn’t on the pill. How could she have been so thoughtless? Slow down, Niki. Lightning won’t strike again. Mentally she counted days, figuring out how many days were “safe.” Relief swelled in her mind.
“Don’t worry, Weston. Your timing is as impeccable as your technique. You’re safe.”
“Dammit, Niki. I wasn’t worried about me. Babies don’t scare me.” His hold on her tightened for a moment before relaxing. He rolled onto his back, and said, “All I wanted was to know you were okay with this. Give me a little credit, Niki. I’m not some macho cowboy with a one-track mind. I didn’t make love to you because you make me hard. I made love to you because I feel like it’s the only way I can get inside and find a piece of you to hold on to.”
A sharp knife turned inside Niki as she realized that the football captain hadn’t cared whether she was okay with anything, how she felt about being pregnant, or whether the baby lived or died. For the first time, Niki began to wonder if things would have been different if Zach had been the football captain. If instead of wishing the baby would go away like a bad dream, she would have smiled secret smiles and rubbed her burgeoning stomach with joy.
“Sorry,” Niki said, and blinked back a tear before it could spill over the edge of her lashes, hating herself all over again for wishing away the precious life she’d carried.
Zach gathered her to him, dropping a kiss on her head. “Hey, don’t worry. Stop assigning motives to everything I say.”
“Old habit,” she apologized, knowing that she’d reacted not to what Zach had said but to years of guilt and telling herself that the only one who cared if Niki got hurt was Niki.
“Want to talk about it?”
“No.”
“You trust me with the secrets of your body but not with the secrets of your heart,” Zach mused. He picked up one of her curls and stroked it against his lips before dropping it back on her bare shoulder. His eyes grew wary as he studied her. “But I guess it’s a start.”
“A start? This is crazy,” she whispered, looking up at him. “We’re crazy.”
He gave her a lopsided grin. “It’s the most fun I’ve had in years.” Suddenly the grin disappeared, and his voice deepened. “What we have could be real, Niki. Don’t throw it away without at least exploring what we have.”
The impact of his words sent Niki’s emotions reeling. Drawing a ragged breath, Niki said, “You don’t fight fair, Weston. You want promises that ignore reality and geography.”
Sensing his advantage, he pushed, “Promise me tomorrow. Forget where you are and who I am. No baggage, no memories. Give me a chance before you put up the walls.”
Was she putting up walls? She knew the answer without asking the question. She’d taken one look at Zach Weston and put him in the never-in-a-million-years category. He was too risky, too dangerous a man. He had the power to make her forget the rules that kept her safe.
God, how she hated the feelings that engulfed her when she came home. She’d spent years putting enough distance between her heart and the regret. The disappointment.
How could she let Zach inside without letting all those feelings slip in with him? Her reserve had always been her security blanket when she came home. She walked on eggshells in Wyoming, and now he was asking her to take a chance. To loosen her grip on her security blanket.
“Tomorrow,” Niki whispered, letting go of the tattered edge of that blanket.
She rested her head on his shoulder. One day. It’s only one day, she told herself. How badly could she be hurt in one day?
EIGHT
“Get up, lazybones.”
Niki made a token effort to open her eyes, but she couldn’t. They might as well have been glued shut. She mumbled a good
excuse and ignored the order,
“What was that?”
“Hmmmpfh.”
“That’s what I thought you said. Cookie, you have three minutes to get your rump on a horse.”
Niki sighed, arched her back, and stretched. Listening to Zach rumble orders was unexpectedly pleasant. But then she’d probably enjoy listening to Zach read from the appliance section of an old Sears catalogue.
Watching her, Zach didn’t know how he was going to keep his hands off her all day. As she stretched, the edge of the covers slipped, revealing the blush of one nipple. Involuntarily his muscles tightened, and the wonderful passion of the night before surged through his loins. Having Niki only made wanting her more intense. Weston, you are in serious trouble if you can’t control yourself better than this. You’ve got a trail drive to run.
“Just five more minutes,” Niki bargained as she finally opened her eyes, surveying Zach’s large frame, noting that it filled the tent opening and then some.
“You’ve already had an extra fifteen minutes.”
She gave him a flirtatious smile and let the sleeping bag slide off one leg. She bent her knee, pinning the bag between her thighs. When she had his full attention, she arched her back and stretched again. This time she never took her eyes off him. The promise in her gaze was intended to persuade him that she deserved a little extra rest.
Zach was reaching to close the tent flap when he came to his senses. “No you don’t.” His tone was firm, but his grin gave away his appreciation for her effort. “You can arouse me that easily, but you’re not going to get around me that easily.”
Disgusted, Niki snatched the covers higher and sat up. “I guess breakfast in bed is out of the question?”
“Breakfast is out of the question. You missed it.”
“You let John eat my breakfast?”
“Only a fool gets between John Carey and Murray’s pan biscuits. There aren’t even enough crumbs left for our bothersome coyote to find.”
Niki’s mouth dropped open. “Murray cooked today?”
Laughing at the disappointment in her face, Zach said, “The one and only chuck wagon accountant. Murray, unlike other guests who shall go nameless, is doing his share of the work this morning.”
“How am I supposed to work if you don’t feed me?”
“Two minutes,” he said, dropping the tent flap.
Niki heard him chuckle as he walked away and knew he’d saved her breakfast. She hugged the knowledge to her a moment before she scrambled to dress.
Niki saddled Cay and galloped off in pursuit of the cattle before she realized they had nothing to do with her haste. She wanted to be with Zach, talk to him, laugh with him. A warm glow of anticipation filled her as she inhaled the clean wilderness air.
A sense of accomplishment also filled her. After almost a week on the trail, she no longer suffered from jelly legs when she got off her horse in the evening—unless she slid into Zach’s arms. She could repack her gear in the blink of an eye. Cay actually obeyed her the majority of the time. And she had produced a few good columns. If she came up with one more good column, even Eli would proclaim the trip a huge success.
Yep, she’d come a long way in a few short days.
Tomorrow, after the cattle were pastured on Weston land, trucks would transport all the hands to the ranch and the drive would be officially over. A few days ago she would have been jumping for joy at the prospect of leaving Wyoming. Now she wasn’t as anxious to leave. Going to bed with Zach hadn’t sated her curiosity as much as whetted her appetite for something she couldn’t even name.
Spit. Why couldn’t they have been terrible together?
Life was always complicated in Wyoming. The state was an emotional Bermuda Triangle as far as she was concerned. Today, however, there would be no regrets, no walls. And no pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, she reminded herself.
As Niki came riding toward him Zach decided the only way to survive his body’s uncontrollable response to her was to get a few dozen pair of oversized jeans. God, she was gorgeous. Vibrant and with a capacity for caring that belied the walls she put around her own heart. He had today and tomorrow to teach her that the “now” was vastly more important than the past.
“Good morning,” Niki said as she stopped beside him, Cay facing north and Dap facing south. Denim thigh scraped against denim thigh.
“I bet you were late to your own graduation,” Zach said.
“I didn’t show up at all,” Niki snapped—then could have shot herself for revealing that unnecessary bit of information, especially when Zach’s expression turned unusually speculative.
His cowboy hat sat rakishly on the back of his head. His jeans were as worn as his chamois shirt, which was the color of old gold coins. Why did Zach always have to look so damned appealing? He smiled down at her, a wonderful, secret smile of pleasure and relief.
A tiny spark of warmth ignited inside her as she realized he’d been watching for her, waiting for her, maybe even pacing the foothills. If one could pace on a horse. “Afraid I wouldn’t show up?”
“That’s not what scared me.”
Shaking off gooseflesh, Niki asked, “Then what worried you?”
“The thought of having to wake you again. I’m a gentleman, Niki. Not a saint.”
She flushed to the roots of her hair, remembering her wanton little display. Her mouth opened and closed as she floundered for something to say. Finally she settled on the least suggestive topic she could think of. “Thanks for breakfast. Murray’s biscuits are to die for. I couldn’t have eaten another bite.”
“Is that so?” Zach restrained the impulse to finger the braid that lay against her breast and coincidentally rub his knuckle against the full mound. Instead he contented himself with saying, “Then I’d better warn you, Cookie. I haven’t had my fill by a long shot.”
The electricity in his gaze sent a shock through her, rattling the very center of her being. Zach Weston was a powerful man. Not a man easily dismissed. Even the large proportions of the great outdoors didn’t dwarf him. Her snappy comebacks and light banter deserted her suddenly, leaving her to answer him with the raw emotion she knew showed in her expression.
It was broad daylight and they were both right smack in the middle of twelve hundred cows, and all she could think about was his hands on her body. Of crawling into his lap and wrapping her legs around him. Of letting the rhythmic motion of the swaying saddle and his hardness give her the pleasure he’d awakened in her last night.
“I’m having enough trouble sitting tall in the saddle without you looking at me like that,” he said wryly.
Niki swallowed. She couldn’t resist suggesting, “Maybe liniment will help your problem.”
“Kill or cure,” Zach admitted warmly. “But I don’t have nearly enough time for the cure, and anything else will kill me. Besides, we’ve got extra work to do today.”
“You and me? Or everyone in general?”
“You and me. That is, if you don’t mind riding off with me into the wilderness, out of sight and earshot of the rest of this crew.”
“What the hell,” she said, tossing her reservations to the winds. “Riding off with you can’t be any worse than sleeping in your tent. What are we going to do? Tear each other’s clothes off and swim naked in the creek?”
“God, what a thought,” Zach declared and found he had to put his weight into the stirrups and make an adjustment that did very little to remedy his predicament.
Niki smothered a chuckle and pretended not to notice. Score another point for New York. Two could play this sensual game of hit and run.
“As seductive as that might be,” Zach continued when he could talk without pain, “and it is one hell of a thought, but we won’t have time. I need to round up some sheep.”
Cay sidled away from the dappled gray, restless at his forced inactivity. “Whoa, boy,” Niki said, and patted her horse on the neck. “Sheep?”
“I run a couple of farm-dog cla
sses every year. People bring their dogs. I provide the sheep. A truck will meet us at the pasture and haul them back to the ranch.”
“Hey, boss,” John yelled. “If you’re going to meet the livestock truck and get back by early afternoon, you’d better hustle.” He tipped his hat toward the lady. “We’ll be crossing Sleepy Creek today, ma’am. It’s quite a sight when it’s filled with cows,” John declared as he rode up on his pretty dim-colored mare.
“Change of plans,” Zach said evenly. “Ms. Devlin is going with me. She thinks she can do a column on farm-dog training.”
Niki did a quick double take before saying, “That’s right. He’s going to let me tag along while I pry information out of him. Is your puppy going to be in the class?”
“Butter’s not old enough yet.”
“Butter?”
“Butterfinger is out of Snicker’s last litter,” Zach explained helpfully.
“She is the prettiest little pup,” John said as proudly as any new father. “Keen for the stock. She’s got eye. You’ve seen eye. Brass has it. That intense way he looks at the stock. It’s a stare that means business.”
John’s enthusiasm was contagious. Niki laughed softly. “You wouldn’t be the least bit prejudiced, would you? Just because you picked her out?”
“Hell, I didn’t pick her out.” John shook his head and scooted his hat back. “I couldn’t have afforded the runt from that litter. Snicker’s a bench champion as well as a stock-dog champion.”
Thoughtfully, Niki transferred her attention to Zach, who looked uncomfortable. “John couldn’t afford one, so you gave him one.”
“Not exactly,” Zach drawled. “I’m not in the habit of giving away valuable breeding stock. But I knew Bess would shoot me if I brought another puppy into the house. Snicker and Brass already have the run of the place. Since I didn’t want Butter raised in the kennel, I was in a real tight spot.”
The ghost of a smile touched Niki’s lips. “So you asked John to do you a favor. Right, John?”
“At first, I thought he meant for me to keep her with me until she was old enough to train. But he pulled out her papers and a list of names. Told me to choose a name and sign the papers. Of course, I owe him a puppy back from her first breeding.”
