Outlaw in Paradise

by Patricia Gaffney

  "I thought you were going to lock this."

  "Forgot. I should. I do sometimes." She hadn't even closed the door, she saw as they walked up the two steps to her minuscule porch. It had been hot this afternoon; she'd left the door open for air. What a long day this had been. She thought of Ham, coming into her office to tell her Joe was here. Had that really been today?

  "Want to come in?" She flushed. What a dumb thing to say.

  "Thanks." She saw his lips quirk, and felt even stupider. But she was happy, too. In fact, she felt on the verge of laughter. Hysteria? Not exactly. More like... euphoria.

  "So." She went to the bureau and struck a match to the oil lamp. "This is where I live." As if he'd never been here before. "But you knew that," she added inanely. Where was all that confidence and calm she'd felt a few minutes ago? It had deserted her the moment she'd seen Jesse in the moonlight. My, but she was a silly girl. "Do you want a drink?" She pivoted away from him, pressing her hands to her hot cheeks. They'd just come out of a saloon, and she was asking him if he wanted a drink. She didn't even have anything in here anyway, no bottle, nothing.

  Fortunately he said, "No, I've had enough." He wasn't drunk, though, she could see that. If anything he looked the opposite. Alert, focused. Focused on her.

  She turned away again. She thought about stalling, of saying, Would you like to see my photograph album? Luckily he caught her hand just then and tugged on it, forcing her to face him. "I like it when you look like this," he told her.

  She melted. "I'm a mess."

  "Yeah, I know."

  They relaxed into smiles. He lifted his hands and slipped them into the hair at the back of her neck, and she unbent a little more, tilting her head back, resting it against his palms. He had a cowlick now, from where Doc Mobius had clipped the hair away from his head wound. A black slash of hair, onesided, cut across the high white of his forehead; she ran her fingers through it, neatening it. His heavy eyelids dropped, hiding his eyes. He said, "I've been looking at you all night."

  "I know. I could feel... I could feel it."

  "Couldn't take my eyes off you. Kept thinking about this. Kissing you."

  "You can kiss me."

  But just before their lips met, she said, "Jesse."

  "Yes?"

  "You know... some people think I do. But I don't."

  "What?"

  "This."

  Before he leaned his forehead against hers, she saw understanding flicker in his dark gray eyes. He took her hands and squeezed them. "Then that makes it even better. Makes me even luckier."

  She put her arms around him, standing on tiptoe to hold him. "Oh, Jess." When he kissed her, she saw white lights pop and shimmer behind her tight-closed eyes, little silent explosions echoing the ones going off in other parts of her body. Why had she waited so long for this? She tilted her head to get closer; she wanted to kiss him deeper, stronger. His hands rubbed under her arms, down her sides to her waist, lower, sliding to the back of her and pulling her up against him. He started backing up and she followed him blind, not letting go. She didn't want to stop kissing him even for a second.

  He banged into the back of the bed, though, and they separated, both of them panting and shiny-eyed. They sat on the edge of the mattress, embracing again immediately. But they didn't kiss. They just held each other, and she could feel the faint, subtle shake of his body with each heartbeat. With hers.

  "I slept... I sl... What is that?"

  She let go of him to see what he was looking at. "Oh." She smiled, closing her eyes while he pulled a strand of hair back and kissed her temple. "My mother sewed them. Words to live by." On two pillow shams at the head of her bed; she'd taken them with her wherever she went for the last fifteen years. Not because they were pretty, or nice, not because she even liked them. But because they were all she had left of her mother.

  "What do they say?"

  She hadn't realized how faded and torn the embroidered threads had grown—Jesse couldn't even read the words. " 'I Slept and Dreamed That Life Was Beauty.' And the other one says, T Woke and Found That Life Is Duty.'" She laughed softly. "Mama's philosophy."

  Jesse looked at her, not the pillows, peering at her in the semidark to see if she was sad. "I don't know anything about you," he said, a wondering note in his voice. "You know more about me than I do about you, Cady."

  "Oh, well. I'm not so interesting." Ha ha. She thought she was very interesting. She was getting more interesting by the day.

  "Well, I want to know everything about you."

  "Okay. I'll tell you my life story. Right now. It's very long."

  It broke him up. He fell over backward, chuckling and snorting. She lay beside him, laughing in sympathy, feeling the bed shake under them. Her heart felt huge, too big for her chest. "I've always wanted this," she confessed to him, wiping away a laugh- tear gliding into her hair. He didn't ask what she meant, so she didn't know if he understood or not. She didn't mean just a lover. More than that. Someone she could play with. She hadn't thought it through—in fact it had never occurred to her till now—but it seemed to her you could trust a lover that you could laugh in bed with.

  He rolled toward her, propping his head on his hand. He put his other hand on her stomach. Her giant heart, the one too big for her chest, jumped into her throat. Such an intimacy, this hand on her stomach, and it was only just beginning. He kept her gaze while he spread her little checkered vest away from her right breast, spread the other half back from her left. He took hold of one end of her loose black cravat and began to pull it out of her collar. Slowly. She listened to the high swish of taut silk pulling, pulling, felt it making the circuit around the back of her neck.

  "I'm stripping you. I'm taking off every stitch of your clothes. You'll be nude in two minutes."

  "Yeah." That was all she was capable of saying. He started sliding buttons out of the buttonholes of her shirtwaist, and she followed his dark fingers as they crept lower and lower. He tugged the blouse out of her skirt and folded the sides back, uncovering her chemise. Plain white cotton today. Drat. It wasn't as if she didn't have plenty of smart, sexy underclothes, a drawer full of them that nobody ever saw. Just her luck.

  Jesse didn't seem to mind, though. He came up on his elbow and hovered over her, his longish hair falling around his face. "So pretty." He tugged on ribbons, unsnapped snaps. "Aha. And now a corset. Sometime—not now—would you explain to me why women like you wear these things? Women who don't need 'em, I mean."

  "So men like you will take them off of us."

  Click. Chink. Corset hooks coming unhooked. She felt cool air on her chest, then warm skin—Jesse's hand. Click, snap. She was free.

  "Ahh," she exhaled on a high, deep sigh. He smoothed his whole hand over her breasts, one and then the other, squeezing softly. Rubbing them around, making them move. His eyes lit on the tattoo under her left nipple. He stroked his thumb over it, frowning, as if he wanted to erase it. She thought he would say something, but he kept quiet, and she couldn't read his expression. What was there to say, anyway?

  He dipped his head and took a swipe of her nipple with his tongue, and she squealed, clenching her toes. Then he started in earnest, tonguing and sucking and nibbling on her. She felt her body getting longer and longer as she stretched and strained under him. Electrical shocks. Sparks that wouldn't stop, just kept jolting and zapping through her, lighting a fire deep down. Should've closed the door, she thought through some kind of a fog. I'm making a lot of noise.

  Finally he stopped, which was just as well. It was time to either move on to the next thing or go completely insane.

  "Too many clothes," he muttered, wet-lipped, and slid off her. They stood up, Jesse holding her hand to help her. She needed help: her knees weren't working at all. He started fumbling with the back of her skirt, but she distracted him by slipping his shirt over his shoulders and pulling it down his arms. She put her flat hands on his rib cage and drew them up, sliding them over smooth, warming skin and kn
otting muscle. His chest had neat, straight hair, all black, growing down from his pectoral muscles and meeting in the middle at his breastbone. Cupping his bare shoulders, she put her face there, pressed her nose to the center of him, right over his heart. She drew in a deep breath, inhaling the smell of dust and horse. Man. Jesse.

  "I'm kind of... I'm not too clean," he said ruefully.

  "True." She kissed his neck, though. Her tongue darted out; she took a daring taste. Hm, salty. "Nope, you aren't too clean," she murmured, hugging him close. "But you are delicious."

  Over his shoulder, she could see his reflection in her dressing-table mirror. Just him, from the backs of his knees to his shoulder blades. And her white hands and arms stroking, holding. She worked her fingers inside his low-slung pants in back, enjoying how that looked. It made her hotter, that and the tight feel of his buttocks, the tops of them, bunching under her hands. Oh, man, oh, man. That's all she could think of—oh, man, oh, man.

  He set her away rather abruptly, muttering something that sounded like, "Get serious here," and started on her skirt again. He wasn't so smooth and sure-fingered now. In fact, he was clumsy—she had to help him. She thought of Jamie, how fast he'd been at this, how practiced. Maybe Jesse didn't have a girl in every port, so to speak. Wouldn't that be nice.

  She wasn't so sure of herself now, either. Her skirt was gone, blouse gone, chemise and corset and petticoats gone. Except for stockings, she was naked. Jesse just stared at her. A flicker of apprehension crept through her. Men liked everything, they were so undemanding, so unbelievably easy to please. At least the men she knew. But Jesse... he wasn't talking. Not saying a word. Did he like the way she looked? She was kind of small. Her breasts were okay, not too little, but the rest of her was small. When she couldn't stand it another second she said, "Well?" with a pretend-laugh—to show she didn't care too much.

  He still didn't say anything, but he made a noise in his throat. And he started shaking his head from side to side. Slow, wondering, amazed shakes.

  He wasn't disappointed.

  That small, freezing sensation she'd had when she wasn't sure began to melt. She could feel her body turning sexual, female. She went close and rubbed herself against him. Bold as brass. "Get naked," she whispered in his ear. Leaving him standing there, she climbed into bed.

  He quit wasting time. If he'd been a little awkward with her buttons, he was a master with his. All in one smooth move, he undid his fly, bent over and shucked trousers and white flannel drawers off simultaneously, and threw them halfway across the room. So reckless. So exciting. And the look of him. Oh, my, yes, Cady thought, going mindless again. Come right over here. Thrilled to death, she patted his place on the bed beside her.

  Too hot for the covers. Plus she wanted to see him. He wanted to see her, too—"Cady, look at you," he kept saying, putting his hands on every part of her he could reach. They couldn't seem to get close enough.

  "Let's hurry," she urged, stroking his back and trying to kiss his mouth, which he had buried in the side of her neck.

  He raised his head. "Really? Hurry?"

  "I was just thinking maybe we should get it over with. Fast. So then we can start over."

  He surrounded her with his arms and covered her with one hairy leg, vibrating with laughter. She laughed, too, although she hadn't been joking. He held her like that, pinned down so she couldn't touch him, and slowly, after a minute or two, her mood changed. She wanted him as much as before, but she didn't feel quite so frantic. He released her, all but his hand on the side of her jaw, two fingers gently coaxing her head around. His eyes... she lost herself looking into his eyes. "Jesse, Jess," she sighed. "Oh, Jess."

  They kissed. It broke her down, it was so deep, so sweet. Was it more than kissing? Her stricken heart toyed with the idea that it was loving.

  He began to touch her, arouse her. It wasn't like anything she'd ever known. Not that she'd known that much. But she'd known some, and this wasn't like it. He had such caring in his hands, he paid such close attention. What he was was riveted. By her.

  It made her absolutely crazy for him. She'd learned from him not to say, "Hurry, Jesse, let's do it now, fast, hurry," but oh, God, it was hard to wait. Weren't women the ones who liked to slow things down? Yes. She knew that from her own experience, but even more from things Glendoline told her—unasked; startling, eye-popping things about what men and women, or at least men and Glen, got up to in bed. Yes, and even Jesse had gone too fast that other time. The last time, out there on her back doorstep.

  Maybe he'd learned his lesson. Heck. Oh, well.

  "Oh, well."

  Out loud she said that. She couldn't keep her mouth shut. He had his tongue in her belly button, and she could hardly stand it. Also his arms around her hips, and he was sliding lower. Oh, God. He locked his arms around her thighs and buried his nose, his mouth, in her private hair. Oh, Jesse, Jess, what are you doing? As much as it shocked her, she wanted to open her legs. She did. But she couldn't because he was holding them shut tight, and even that was a deep, grinding pleasure, the fact that she couldn't move.

  "Oh, oh, wait'll I get you," she threatened emptily, touching the back of his head, stroking through thick, straight, long hair. "I'll get you and you'll... you'll be..."

  All at once he pulled her thighs wide apart and dove over her, landing on his elbows and sinking down on top of her. He said, "Ahh," and she sympathized: a perfect fit. He hooked his hands under her arms and grabbed her shoulders. He smiled into her eyes—he looked so happy, so pleased. It's not complicated for you, she thought. I wish I were like a man.

  She put her legs around his legs, and they kissed, and he came right into her, smooth as silk. He groaned, a really long, loud, heartfelt sound, and then held still inside her. "I couldn't wait any longer, Cady. Sorry."

  "I forgive you."

  They started to move together, and it was a little ragged at first, both trying so hard to please. But after a while they figured out that they both liked the same thing, at least for now—long, slow, deep strokes, holding tight, and not kissing. Concentrated.

  And he liked to talk—that was a revelation. He said what they were doing while they were doing it. He named names. That you could do that had never even occurred to her. But she liked it. After the shock wore off, she really loved it. He started to ask her what she wanted—"This? Like this?"—and pretty soon she couldn't talk, couldn't answer. "Nhh," she said, or at the most, "Yah."

  She was coming undone. She was coming. They'd barely begun, and she was coming. Oh, good good good, because sometimes she didn't, sometimes—

  Brain clicked off. Heat, slick, full, do it, get me, Jesse now, Jesse now—

  Yes. Flying out over it, up and over. Just—there. Yes, perfect, ah.

  Ah.

  He said, "Gotcha," and she said, "Got me," thinking it was over.

  He started over. Didn't even change positions, just started up again. "Oh, no," she said, "really. I couldn't." Ha. He knew more than she did. He covered her breast with his mouth, and it was like he'd never been there before. And she was so sensitive now. He'd skinned her or something, made it all new and raw and exquisite. He slid his hands down her back, down to her bottom, and he spread her cheeks a little, opening her up more. She gasped. He widened his legs, and that made her widen hers. He started saying dirty words, and just like that—she was there again, right up to that high place that was so easy, he made it so easy, to leap from and fall, fall, fall. You come, too, she thought, or maybe said, and he did. She knew because he drove so deeply and he made the loudest sound, pure joy, just manly ecstasy, she wanted to laugh or cry and press him in, in, more.

  So greedy. There wasn't any more, this was it. Enough. They collapsed on each other. Cady said, "Well, I never," and that was the God's truth.

  She had a little strength left to kiss his mouth and pet the smooth muscle in his forearm. "I love... I loved that," she changed it to. She wasn't crazy.

  "Cady."

  "
Hm?"

  "Cady." That's all he would say. He kept his eyes closed and said her name some more, smiling. She took it as a good sign.

  Nine

  Cady sat at the edge of the lamplight, half in and half out, brushing her hair in front of her dressing table mirror. The right side of her head was dark and mysterious, black as midnight, but the left side had fire in it. Red gleams flashing and disappearing, as if they were playing a game with the silver-handled brush she dragged through it in long, lazy strokes, scalp to ends, scalp to ends. Jesse could feel his face going slack, mouth half open, eyelids drooping. She was hypnotizing him.

  "You falling asleep?" She caught his eye in the mirror.

  "Nope."

  "Good." She laid the brush down and stood up. Something red hung on the side of the mirror, a scarf or something, draped over the front and back. She whisked it off and moved toward the bed. He'd seen her in her paisley robe before, that day when Clyde and Turley busted in and tried to scare her, but it hadn't affected him that much. Unlike now. She'd had some clothes on under it then; he hadn't been able to see every naked curve and flare she had, not to mention the soft, springy wobble of her breasts when she walked. He blinked his eyes; he was getting hypnotized again.

  She sat on the edge of the mattress, and automatically he reached for the silk belt of her robe. Just to play with. She watched his face, turning her head to different angles, studying him. He smiled, batted his eyes. What was she up to?

  "Lean forward," she said. He did, and she snaked the scarf in her hands—it was a scarf—around his neck and started to tie it in a bow. She finished and sat back, giving the bow and his chest a little pat. "Ha," she said. "Just as I thought." She got up and went back to her dressing table, began rooting around in the drawers.

  "What are you doing?"

  She returned with more scarves. "May I?" She lifted his right arm and tied a blue and green one around his biceps. He started to laugh. "Colors," she explained, beaming. "I wanted to see how you look in something besides black."

  "And?"