“Your hair is so long,” he murmured. “I could wrap us up in it.”
“Don’t you dare.” She feathered more kisses across his face. “You’ll be trapped in my web.”
“Then we would be in our own world.” He twisted her strands around his fists.
“What do you want that world to be like?” She closed her eyes when he captured her mouth in a drugging kiss.
“Like this, for starters.” He drew her into a world of passion. Their bodies heated the air. Their breathing matched the rhythm of longing that had begun to build between them.
She lost all sense of her surroundings as they explored the territory of each other’s desires. His heartbeat thudded against her chest when he felt her delight in his touch. He sighed when she nudged the cords of muscle between his neck and shoulder with her mouth. Her sigh of pleasure echoed his.
“Do you feel this?” he murmured. “We are perfect for each other. Your body fits against mine.”
“I want to please you,” she whispered as she feathered his ear with tiny kisses. “I was afraid you wouldn’t understand why I was here. When the professor started accusing me, along with Wayne, I was terrified you’d think I was guilty.”
“It crossed my mind,” he admitted. “For so long I thought you were part of the drug ring. Then, seeing you with Wayne…”
“I know.” She stilled his words with another kiss. Her mouth opened to let him invade the moist territory.
He gently pushed her onto her back, following the motion until his body covered hers. She arched, wanting him to know her. It seemed her fingers were all thumbs as she smoothed them across and the intimate contours of his body.
She smoothed her palms across the broad expanse of his muscled abdomen. She loved the way it flexed under her touch. She captured his gasp in her mouth as she drew him into another kiss. He shifted and the nugget Real Tall Man had given her fell against her hand. She was glad to know Jess had worn it.
Under the kaleidoscope of stars and moonlight, they offered their bodies to each other to touch, caress, and kiss. In the night stillness that surrounded them, the owl hooted again. Autumn barely registered the sound. Her earlier concern had no room to bloom. Passion ruled her now. All of her senses were focused on Jess—his salty taste, the smooth skin covering his steely muscles, the hot breath that singed her body as he trailed kisses from her mouth to her neck.
His tongue caressed and she flexed, pushing her chest against him. “Do you feel my heart?” she whispered, the sound hoarse from passion. “Can you doubt that I care when it beats like that for you?”
She played her fingers across his chest and felt the answering response. “You see. Your heart is like the drum Grandfather uses. Was it beating like this last night when I chanted my dream?” She leaned into him, pressing her stomach against his. “I love you,” she whispered into his mouth.
His fingers stilled. She waited expectantly for him to continue his caress. It was several seconds before she realized he wasn’t going to. Suddenly she shifted and tried to see his face.
“Jess, what is it?”
“You scare the hell out of me, Autumn O’Neill.”
.
CHAPTER 19
Jess’s eyes glittered as he stared at her. Autumn tried to read his expression, but it was too dark. She covered his fingers with her own and eased the pressure of his hold.
“What is that supposed to mean?” she asked.
“You haunt my dreams, and now you mention love.” His shoulders sagged as he dropped his hands. She leaned toward him, puzzled and unexpectedly apprehensive.
“What is it? Did I do something wrong? Break a taboo?”
“No.” He traced his cheek. “You’re too powerful for me.”
It was Autumn’s turn to sag back on the bedroll. She stared.
“I dreamed last night.” His voice was low.” I heard the words of the dream way. I saw images of you throwing stones into the sky—like Coyote.”
Her confusion turned into relief. “See. It worked again. I changed the few words I know from the Vision Song. I’ve heard Real Tall Man do sings. We communicated in our dreams. We do have a special bond between us.”
“No.” He leaned away from her. “It was coincidence.”
He didn’t believe that, any more than she did. She could hear it in his voice.
“It shouldn’t upset you. You should be thankful. Your chants saved my life in the cave. It…”
“Real Tall Man sang that night. Not me.”
She smoothed her palm over his cheek. “But I saw your image in my dreams that night in the cave. You kept telling me to keep moving. If you hadn’t been there, I would have curled up and died.”
“Don’t say it.” He smothered her words with his mouth as he pulled her against his chest.
Her arms entwined around his neck. She combed her fingers through his hair. Need built within her to assure him that the dreams were right.
“Hold me,” she whispered into his neck, wanting to express her love. “Don’t think about any of it now. Just feel this.” She feathered kisses across his face. “And this.” She pressed her body against his. “And this.” She captured his mouth.
Her breasts pressed against his chest. She felt the striated muscles of his abdomen quiver against the softness of hers. Her arms wrapped tightly around him as she smoothed her palms across his skin.
Her heart thudded with a mixture of relief and pleasure when he moaned and spread his hands across her back. For endless moments they embraced, absorbing each other.
Time blurred. Movement centered on touching him. When she broke apart to gasp for breath, she found herself pressed into the sleeping bag by the weight of his body, a weight she reveled in.
His body touched all of her, but she wanted more. She curved her leg up and over his hip, unconsciously drawing him against her heated thighs.
“See. This has to be right,” she managed. “We fit together.”
“I want you.” He held her tight, his muscles quivering with restraint.
“I want you, too.” She buried her face against his neck, absorbing the scent of his skin. “I need your love.”
Again he paused. For endless seconds he held her, unmoving, barely breathing. Slowly, he released his hold and placed his hands on either side of her face. His thumbs traced as he talked.
“I can offer you physical pleasure.” He kissed her lips. “I can offer you caring.” He kissed her again, but this time when he spoke, regret sounded in his voice. “But I don’t know if I can give you what you really need.”
“I don’t understand.” She angled her head, trying to see his face, but it was hidden in the shadows. “Is there someone else?” She had been sure there wasn’t.
“No. There hasn’t been anyone who comes close to affecting me the way you do.”
“Then what is it? Help me to understand.” She fought down the growing concern.
“Now, when we’re together, it’s right. But that’s because of the physical attraction we have for each other.”
“That’s where we can start. But there’s more between us than sexual interest,” she insisted. “There’s the love of the land.”
“And The People?” His question rang with a touch of sarcasm.
“They are a part of our lives.” Her concern grew. This subject, she knew, could destroy their fragile bonds. “We’ll just have to work out what that will mean to our relationship. Surely we can manage that?”
“The reality is what will prevent us from finding any happiness.”
Autumn raised her head and tried to read his expression in the faint light. “That doesn’t sound promising.”
“I can’t make promises.” He caressed her cheek. “I want to make love to you. I care about you. But you must understand, I’m not sure that I can let that become love.”
“What are you saying? You’d like a relationship, but forget about commitment—love?”
“Exactly.”
She
drew away and rolled onto her back. The stars that twinkled above started to blur. Determined to act mature, she blinked back the unexpected moisture. “You know I can’t accept that. I need those things. I’ve worked hard to find family. I need…” A family of my own, she thought, but refused to voice her desire.
Commitment and love were something that had to be offered. They could never be demanded.
Jess shifted until, braced on his elbows, he hovered above her. “It wouldn’t be fair to let you believe otherwise, I care enough not to do that to you.”
“Honesty can hurt sometimes.”
He started to touch her hair but pulled back his hand, evidently changing his mind. “I’ve thought a lot about this, ever since the other day, when I found you in the cave.”
She’d thought, too—mistakenly, though. It had been her impression that a relationship could grow and exist between them. How could she have been so wrong?
“You care too much about the old ways. You want to be part of two worlds.” He lowered his head to rest it on his fists.
Autumn started to track her fingers through his hair, but clenched them into fists at her side. “We are of two worlds. Why would you want to deny that?”
“Because you can’t live them both. There is conflict.”
“There’s always conflict in life. You can’t run away from one and not expect to find another.” She grasped his clenched fists, hoping the physical contact would help him understand the words and thoughts she wanted to convey.
“Look at you now. You claim you aren’t Dineh, but that past is part of you. You have more distress by trying to disassociate yourself from that culture than you would if you’d just accept who you are.”
He shook off her hands. “There are things you don’t understand.”
“Like your father?”
His sharp intake of breath echoed in the night, but she didn’t regret her words. His doubts had to be brought out in the open if she stood a chance of establishing the type of relationship she needed from him.
“I know about what happened to him.”
His curse, along with the sudden movement when he sat upright, startled her. She shifted so that she sat facing him, her feet tucked to one side.
“You think you know everything, but you don’t. You have no idea what it’s like to be a child and be called bilasanna.”
“I don’t even know what it means, so of course I wouldn’t know.” Annoyance mounted. She fought for control.
“It means apple. Red on the outside…”
“…white on the inside. Oh, Jess.” The absurdity broke through her temper. “Do you realize how ridiculous that is for an argument against love? Children will always find words to call each other.”
She started to laugh, sure it was as much from nerves as humor. His answering chuckle touched her heart.
“You’re right,” he admitted. “I’m running scared here. I already told you that.”
“I see that clearly now. What can I do to ease your fears? Don’t you think that together we can overcome the doubts and problems that will occur?”
He stared at her for a few minutes, his thoughts obviously running deep. She waited, patience a necessity.
He spoke, low and hushed. “Maybe it’s your worldliness. When you arrived, I never figured you’d last a year.”
“You mean all the traveling I’ve done?” she asked, surprised. “What do you think I’m doing here, Jess? I’m searching for more than family history. I need stability. I yearn for permanence. The fact that I’ve lived in so many places makes me long for a simple life.”
“How did you think you were going to find that out here?”
She shrugged. “I didn’t know. Maybe it’s the quarter of me that is Navajo. I feel connected to the earth—a clear sense of oneness. Don’t you feel that at times?”
“We do have that in common.”
“I traveled in the jet set, but I always had this sense of longing, like I needed to find something. I thought it was a need to know who my real parents were.” As the words flowed, insight dawned. She suddenly realized what she’d been searching for.
“I was lost, Jess. I didn’t even know I was hurting until I came here. I realized this deep yearning to get closer to my inner self. I wanted truths—to touch them, feel them, drink them in.”
And what truths have you found?” Jess asked, his voice distant, as if his thoughts had deepened with hers.
“Love. It’s the final truth, Jess. I love you and feel fulfilled sharing it with you. But there’s more than that.” She paused, letting her thoughts form. “It’s accepting who I am. Not trying to be Indian. Not trying to be sophisticated. Just to be me—a person who loves and cares.”
“Sounds simple enough.”
“But it never is,” she assured him. “We’re too quick to doubt, to worry, and to try to be what society dictates.”
“And what do you do when two cultures pull you apart? I try hard to be Anglo, yet there’s a part of me that slips into the ways of Dineh.”
“Why do you fight it? You are of two worlds. It would be like me trying to be a man. I can do some things males do, but there will always be an inherent part of me that’s female.”
“That I can be thankful for.”
She grasped his hand and placed it against her, refusing to let him lighten the mood. “Just accept yourself and build on those characteristics that give your life peace and harmony.”
“I’m a realist, Autumn. I have a ranch to run, men to oversee. I don’t have time for idealism.”
“Do both, Jess. Others have. Real Tall Man lives each day as it comes.”
“He’s an exceptional man.”
“So are you.” She laced her fingers between his. “He told me once that he lives to be who he is—not an imitation.”
Jess’s mind reeled. She sounded just like Daya. Your woman will bring you back to The People. She will show you how to love again.
Autumn tugged on his arm and he shook off her hand. Her hair draped around her like a shroud. He wanted it to hide her face. Moonlight glistened in the moisture of her dark eyes, reminding him of the Apache tears Daya always wore.
The turquoise nugget bounced against his chest. It suddenly felt like a weight tying him down to the old ways. He lifted it over his head and handed it to Autumn.
At first she didn’t take it. “You can shed that symbol, but it won’t be so easy to get rid of the feelings we share.”
“Take it.” He draped it around her neck and watched it settle between her breasts. “It means more to you than it could to me.”
The silver gleamed against her skin. He didn’t think he would ever forget the sight of her with her hair draped around her, and her eyes glimmering with sadness. He knew that with her it would have to be all or nothing. For that reason, he didn’t prevent her from straightening her shirt.
“I won’t give up on you. Your love means too much to me.”
His heart ached for her, and for himself.
“I’ll fight for us,” she continued, undaunted by his refusal to respond. “Someday you’ll understand, like I did that night in the cave.” She took a shaky breath and he had to force himself not to pull her into his arms. “It doesn’t matter what world we’re in. It doesn’t matter that we’re part Indian, part white.”
“I have a ranch to run. I need to be strong.,” he tried to explain. “I can’t afford to succumb to this weakness of doubting myself. I don’t have time to figure out who I am.”
“I’m not trying to make you do that.” She placed her hand on his chest. Her touch soothed away a small portion of the turmoil that her words created. “I’m trying to help you understand that we don’t need to question our past history, worry about our bloodlines, or make a choice between one way or another. The important thing is that we exist. We are an entity within ourselves. We can only be who we are—not try to meet the expectations of the Anglo world, or those of The People. Just be.”
“You
ask too much.”
“Accept yourself, Jess. Then you can share with others and love.”
The small boy who had loved Daya was locked behind the wall he’d built around his heart. Could he afford to reexamine the innocence of his youth? The risk was too great. He needed to cling to the world he’d established for himself.
“I want you, Autumn.” Pain knifed through his heart, but love demanded honesty. “I can’t live in both worlds again. You have to understand.”
Wrapped up in the turmoil of his emotions, he almost didn’t hear the whispered shout. Another voice growled, and its authoritarian ring cut through him. He sat still and listened.
A footstep sounded nearby. He couldn’t see. He pulled Autumn down beside him. His body tensed for action and his heart raced. “Don’t move or we’ll shoot,” as raspy voice growled from the direction of the kiva.
He recognized that voice. It belonged to one of the killers—the scar-faced man. An alarming cackle came from the left of him. His partner, Jess surmised. A flow of animal fury surged through him. How dare these scum threaten Autumn? The flare of anger helped stem his fear for Autumn’s safety.
“Put your hands up in the air and come on out here, real slow.”
“Get the light out of our eyes, then. We can’t see.” He could barely control the sound of fury in his voice. These men would be foolish not to watch him. Perhaps he could create a distraction. Would Autumn catch on?
He pretended to slip. Autumn slid with him in a mad scramble. A silenced bullet thudded into the sand at his feet, its impact spraying the small granules into his flesh. Autumn jerked her legs under her and stood in a flash with arms upraised.
“Try that again and the next bullet will be in your head.”
The man meant it. Jess eyed the gun with wary respect. Its barrel jutted from the shadows. Silencers! No one would hear the shots fired from these guns.
Clothing rustled as one of the men stepped closer—the scar-faced man. He appeared more menacing in the shadowy light. The odor of nervous sweat drifted by. Anxiety sounded in the high pitch of his voice.
Love's Dream Song Page 28
