Books by Linda Conrad

by Conrad, Linda

  She drew her hand away from his chest, wondering what on earth she’d been thinking, to be touching him so boldly.

  That was when she noticed her body had become hypersensitive. She fidgeted and grasped the edge of her T-shirt to hold it out from her chest. But as she squirmed, the silk of her bra cups rubbed over her nipples and made them stiffen. Every movement made her breasts more extended and unbelievably tender.

  Sheesh. Her clothes were too tight against her swollen flesh. But they had been just fine a minute ago.

  It had been a long time since she’d wanted a man to remove her clothes and touch her intimately. But that’s what she wanted now. And she wanted that man to be Kody. Right this instant.

  “Reagan?”

  He was looking at her as if she’d lost her mind. Maybe she had. Her whole body was vibrating. The heat and the tingles moved through her belly, along her spine and into her chest and lungs. She was drowning in need, electrified with desire….

  Closing her eyes again, she tried to force herself to concentrate on something else. For most of her life, whenever she’d been lonely or embarrassed, Reagan had focused on the calculus and trigonometry problems hovering in the back of her brain. But there would be no comfort in solving equations today.

  “Something’s screwy,” she said aloud as her eyes popped open. “I don’t understand. The numbers are gone.”

  Kody closed the tiny gap between them and took her by the arm. “What’s wrong? You look…you look…”

  The minute he touched her, Kody knew exactly what she’d been feeling. He caught the sensual vibrations through his fingertips.

  Heat. The flames closed in around his hand and moved up his arm. He had thought they might need to build a fire to stay warm, but now it didn’t seem important.

  She touched the tip of her tongue to her lip and gazed at him with a dazed expression on her face. Kody got the immediate impression of sexual desperation. It turned him on just watching it cross her face.

  He backed up a step. But he felt the overwhelming arousal as it crawled along his arteries to swamp him, invading his lower body and rising like floodwaters.

  “I don’t know what’s going on here,” he said tentatively. “But whatever is happening with you, and…me, we can’t do anything about it. Not now, at least. We can’t. Can you wait until we get back to civilization?”

  Just who was he trying to convince? he wondered. Reagan didn’t seem capable of making good judgments, or maybe any judgments, at the moment. Her eyes stared at his lips, unseeing. The tips of her nipples pushed out, stretching their cotton covering. She leaned toward him, absently begging to be touched and soothed.

  So it was up to him to do the right thing. But right and wrong were tough concepts when every fiber of his being ached for just one thing: release.

  How had all this happened so fast? Just a moment ago everything was different. He was the professional. The FBI special agent. The man who was knowledgeable about things like Anasazi and Skinwalkers. She was the pretty, if rather ditzy, genius mathematician, searching for her father.

  His body had noticed hers. Right from the start. But the pulsing, thrumming, sensual beat had been simple to push aside, at least temporarily. Until they’d climbed that ladder and landed on the rock shelf at the ruin.

  He had to stop and think. But…but…

  Ease the desire. Give in to the compulsion. The words echoed in his head without his permission. They slithered through his veins and began squeezing out other thoughts.

  Warmth suddenly didn’t matter. Nor did food, water or even air. Nothing in the world could ever be as important as touching her, tasting her. Giving in to what their bodies craved.

  Fisting his hands, he shoved them into his jeans pockets and took another step back from temptation. Somehow he had to find the strength to resist.

  Damn his weak flesh. He had to think.

  Through the haze swirling in Reagan’s brain, she could’ve sworn she heard a deep, mysterious chuckle. It was a slight noise. A shadow of reality. Here and then gone.

  But then a very real swishing sound reached her ears—loud and distinct, and seeming to come from everywhere at once. She looked around the room and checked behind her. It sounded for all the world like a woman in a satin ball gown, dancing through the dark shadows of the ancient ruin.

  Reagan glanced over to Kody, wondering if the sound was somehow in her imagination, or if he’d heard the same thing. She’d been feeling goofy; maybe it was all part of a dream.

  He pointed toward the floor, in the direction of the open doorway.

  There, silhouetted against the cement-gray light of the stormy dusk, a black rope curled at the threshold. The long, smooth entity moved, slid sideways and blocked the exit.

  “Oh my God,” she shrieked. “A snake!”

  This time there was no hesitation. No thinking. No consideration of consequences.

  Reagan jumped at Kody, clawed at his shoulders and tried to climb his body. She had to get her feet off the ground. Had to press herself closer to him. Maybe even find a way to climb right inside his chest and hide.

  He wrapped one arm around her waist to keep her from slipping. At the same time, her legs twisted around his hips as she tried to hang on for dear life.

  “Don’t panic.” Kody shifted his stance to keep her off the floor and tightly within his embrace. “It’s not poisonous. We’ve just managed to disturb the snake’s winter slumber. He’s not mad at us.”

  Reagan paid no attention to his words and tightened her grip on him while hitching her hips even higher. She buried her face in the side of his neck as he felt her whole body cringe.

  It should be up to him to get a mental grip. To think, not act.

  Do all the right things, he tried to tell himself. But when his groin tightened in response to the apex of her thighs pressing against the zipper of his jeans, he figured there wasn’t going to be a chance to do anything right. Something, someone, had to give….

  Rubbing her back in soothing circles with his free hand, he tried reasoning. “Snakes have to live somewhere. It’ll go away in a minute when it sees we aren’t leaving. How about—?”

  “Don’t put me down,” she cried. “Please. Please!”

  Kody’s knees were flexing from the weight of the lush redhead’s rounded body. Her hips were full and her figure was perfect in every way a woman’s should be. But she was just too damn heavy to continue holding like this. He backed up to the smooth stone wall, leaned against it for balance and tried once again to soothe her with words.

  “The snake’s leaving, Reagan. See? It’s gone. It got bored waiting and left to find somewhere quieter. So now you can—”

  “No,” she said, more quietly this time but with a more urgent demand in her voice. Her body relaxed and he knew she believed him about the snake leaving.

  But instead of getting down, she wiggled her bottom, pressing herself harder against him and nuzzling her lips at the side of his neck.

  He nearly bit his tongue. “Stop squirming. I can’t take much more. Get down now. Put your feet on the ground. Everything is fine. We’ll be just fine.”

  “I don’t…I don’t want to get down. I want to get closer. I want you to touch me. Please, Kody.”

  “Do you know what you’re asking?” He wasn’t sure he knew up from down or day from night anymore. How could she know?

  She shivered and dug her fingers into his shoulders in an obvious attempt to cling ever tighter. The prickling sensation of her biting nails set off his whole body. It would be so easy for him to forget everything.

  Her warm breath tickled his skin as she groaned and said, “Yes. I know.”

  Chafing her breasts back and forth over his chest, she tried to make the point with her body. She knew. And he knew she knew.

  But—“This isn’t right, Reagan. We’ve just met….”

  “I need you,” she begged. “I need you to take the ache away.”

  Shoving her hips against his
erection again and again, she stretched up and took his earlobe into her mouth, driving him beyond wild. She nipped it, then pulled back and blew a warm breath over the tingling spot, soothing the pain of the bite.

  The tiny thread of resolve that he’d been clinging to disintegrated and dissolved, swept aside with that last breath of air.

  “Dammit, Reagan. This is all wrong.”

  Those might’ve been the right words, but his body didn’t accept them. He leaned forward and settled his mouth over hers in a demanding kiss.

  Wrong or right. Easy or hard. There simply was no choice. Kody would not deny her—or himself.

  Outside the ancient ruin, the shadow of a snake slithered down through the craggy rocks toward a secret passage to the ground. Pleased that he had been able to put the right thoughts into the bright bilagáana woman’s head, the snake snapped his tail with pride.

  He had tried mind control for the first time back at the trading post. But he’d only managed to bring the two subjects out here to the ruins. Obviously that had been good enough. It gave him a second opportunity to wipe her mind clean and put the urgent sexual desperation where her own thoughts had once been.

  Raising his head and flicking his tongue, the snake smelled the sexual musk between the two humans right through the solid rock. Joining them together in mindless sex was bound to bring chaos and confusion to the half-and-half lawman—and perhaps also to the entire Brotherhood.

  And if the Navajo Wolf had been right in his original assessment, the snake would now have the power to order the white woman about the reservation at will, simply by putting the correct thoughts into her mind.

  Hissing back a smile, the snake swelled himself up and made a dash for his hole. Happy to feel the Navajo world tilting out of balance, he thought of the Skinwalkers’ major goals as they coincided with his own.

  Money equals power. Balance is bad. Greed is good.

  Reagan’s body reacted almost violently to Kody’s passionate kiss, leaving her breathless and stunned. She wanted to experience in the fullest way everything that was happening to her. Both in body and mind.

  Hoping beyond hope to remember this sharp physical need forever, she closed her eyes and tried to focus. But her usual clear head was anything but.

  Somewhere in her subconscious, she gave herself permission to stop trying to think and to simply feel…just this once.

  Kody’s tongue rubbed over her lips, darting inside her mouth to dance past teeth and over tongue. His moves were abrupt, but exactly what she wanted.

  She felt her body go loose with mindless pleasure when he sucked her bottom lip into his mouth, nipped it between his teeth and then lathed it soothingly with his tongue.

  This was all so wonderful. His hardness pushed against her, and the harder he grew the softer she became.

  Why couldn’t she concentrate on what was happening between them? She wished to remember it forever. To use the memory during a future dark and lonely hour, bringing it out to please herself when the rest of the world ignored her needs. But her mind was simply refusing to cooperate.

  Reagan fisted her hands in his hair and gave everything over to the kisses, though other parts of her body were starting to demand their share of attention.

  Kody was beyond salvation. He turned them around and wedged her back against the wall so he could slip a free hand between their bodies. His coat edged off her shoulders and fell to the floor below them as he pushed her cotton shirt up so he could more easily reach her breasts.

  Needing to touch…and then to taste, he worked his hand under the silky material of her bra and flicked his thumb over one puckered tip. Reagan moaned into his mouth and writhed wildly against his fingers.

  “More. More,” she groaned against his lips. “Touch me everywhere. I can’t stand it.”

  He would’ve given a piece of his soul to be able to see her. To watch her body grow rosy and full under his touch. To gaze upon her face as she climbed the mountain to orgasm. But the night and the storm had closed in, and blackness cocooned them in an ancient room filled with blind desire.

  Kody followed his instincts and used his fingers and his mouth to give her satisfaction. He would have to let the erotic sounds she made be his guide.

  Fortunately, she was very vocal. Every moan, every gasp spurred him on and reverberated in his gut.

  Twisting and groaning against him, Reagan grabbed the front of his shirt and ripped it out of his waistband. She flattened her hand against his belly, then popped the button of his jeans and tried to slide her fingers lower.

  Kody nearly bent double as he sucked one of her nipples into his mouth and tugged. Her response was incredible. Carnal and primitive.

  He heard the zipper on his fly going down as she pushed her fingers against his groin. And when she reached his erection, palming it and circling her fingers around the tip, Kody’s knees failed him.

  Backing away enough to lower her, he pushed her legs off his hips and let her feet sink to the ground. She threw her arms around his neck and planted her feet while he spread his coat out under them with one hand.

  “Hold on, sweetheart,” he groaned.

  In one of the smoothest moves he’d ever made, Kody pushed her jeans down her legs and ripped them and her new boots clear in less than thirty seconds. Pretty good for a guy who was operating blind.

  But when he knelt to press a kiss into her belly, and breathed in the scent of her musk, it was as if someone turned on the lights. In his mind he saw her clearly. Every quivering muscle, every silky inch of skin, every intimate crevice.

  Suddenly, the whole scene became much more personal. What they were doing was less about simple sexual gratification than it was about pleasing a woman he had come to care for.

  He wasn’t sure how and why things had changed, but when his mind’s eye had recognized her body, his heart had recognized her spirit.

  Reagan whimpered and pleaded incoherently for an end to her desperation. She dug her hands through his hair and dragged her fingers across his scalp.

  Ignoring every doubt and question he might’ve had, Kody spread her thighs apart and nuzzled her mound. He palmed her intimately, using his fingers to smooth the way.

  Finding her wet and swollen and ready for him to taste, he replaced his fingers with his mouth and gave in to his own needs and desires. With the first touch of his tongue, Reagan’s body jumped and she cried out.

  Her cries echoed in his head as he reveled in her taste. Losing himself fully in the moist satin of her core, he held her tightly, letting both hands cup her bottom.

  Reagan’s legs began to shake violently and her knees seemed to be failing her. Worried that she might somehow hurt herself in the erotic daze, Kody shoved his own jeans down and then lowered her carefully to his lap so he could keep one protective arm around her waist. It was time to give in to what both their bodies demanded.

  Reagan hovered over his erection for a tense second as he fitted himself just inside her welcoming sheath. But when the tip of his flesh entered hers, her whole body jerked again as she shoved her hips down hard against him. Her body seemed to have a mind of its own, reacting like it could not stand to be separate from his for another instant.

  Ah. He sat perfectly still, letting her adjust to him and giving his body a chance to relish the tight, satiny fit that felt so oddly right and so…familiar.

  But Reagan apparently didn’t want to remain still. She arched her back and pumped her hips, calling his name.

  He felt her internal muscles start to spasm around him. Needy and more reckless than he’d ever been in his life, Kody ran the flat of his hand up her belly and shoved the shirt and bra out of his way so he could take a nipple into his mouth again.

  Tugging and sucking her warm peak with abandon, he let an electrified warmth surround them both. He grasped her hips and set his own pace, praying dimly that her pleasure would come along with his.

  The slick motion became sweet sensory torture. Exquisite pain battled
at the precipice of total bliss.

  He felt her body begin its splintering climax, encircling his flesh and sucking him ever deeper into the whirlpool that was all Reagan.

  Just then, and for whatever reason, Kody’s lost sense of time and place came back with an amazing rush. Reality hit him square in the gut. Too late to save everything, it was not too late to do one thing right.

  When he was sure her sweat-slicked body was finally beginning to go slack, Kody pulled out just in time, as his own climax put a shattering end to their mesmerizing dark dream.

  8

  R eagan woke up out of a deep, dreamless sleep and tentatively opened one eye, only to realize that her arms and legs were wrapped around Kody’s body.

  Careful not to wake him, she lifted her head from his shoulder and eased her upper body back far enough to try figuring out what time it might be. If she learned the time, then she should be able to guess how long they’d been together like this.

  The pearl-gray light surrounding them probably meant it was dawn. Did she really want to know that?

  She was still half-naked and sitting on his lap, for heaven’s sake.

  Sneaking tiny peeks around the room without moving her head, she discovered the ugly truth. Yep. Apparently, they had spent the night in each other’s arms. But daylight was making last evening’s dark and shadowed frenzy seem more like a dream than like something that had really happened.

  Kody appeared to be asleep, with his back resting against one of the smooth sandstone walls of the ancient Anasazi dwelling. His chest, with shirt buttons popped open to reveal a broad expanse of bronzed skin, had been lying under her all night like a bed. How embarrassing…and how titillating.

  Flashes of what they’d done together last night—what she had begged him to do with her—sent both chills and fever along her spine. How could she have been so bold and stupid? And how would she ever be able to face him in the light of day?

  She closed her eyes and tried to bring it all back, but it wouldn’t come. Only brief flashes of the night could be retrieved from the place in her mind where her usual memories were stored.