Rugged Texas Cowboy

by Lora Leigh

  He bent over her as she watched, her eyes widening, the breath halting in her throat until she felt the rapid, fierce strike against her aching clit. The sweep of his tongue was like wildfire, sending her hips arching closer to his mouth as a strangled scream erupted from her throat. Another hot lash and she was twisting beneath him, her knees bending, feet pressing into the mattress as she lifted closer.

  “Stay still.” His hand landed on the open flesh of her cunt.

  Shock resounded through her. She felt the explosion trigger in her clit, setting off fireworks in her pussy then in her womb as her orgasm took her by surprise. A strangled scream of rapture tore past her throat as she pressed her head into the pillow, her eyes closing as she shuddered through the extraordinary pleasure.

  “Jack…” She still ached. She was empty, burning.

  “Oh, baby, how greedy that little pussy is.”

  She realized then that she was still holding herself open for him, giving him a clear view into the spasming opening to her vagina.

  He moved slowly between her thighs.

  “We can play later.” He lifted her hands, holding her by the wrists as he lay them by her head. “Stay there. Stay real still, baby, and I’ll see about feeding that hungry little cunt.”

  God, he looked so wicked. With his long hair hanging around his face, those dark-blue eyes glittering beneath the lowered eyelids, his lips fuller, more sensual than before. He resembled the wicked, sexual dream vision she had lusted after for so many years. The one that came to her only in the dead of night, his features hidden, only the gold torque encircling his neck a familiar sight to her.

  And how she longed to see that torque there now. Gleaming dully against his sun-rich flesh as he made a place for himself between her legs.

  Her gaze went lower, her mouth drying at the thick length of his cock as he paused, kneeling between her thighs, watching her, driving her insane with the wait.

  “Lift to me,” he growled. “Raise your hips for me.”

  She did as he commanded, bracing her feet against the blankets and lifting her drenched pussy for the stretching she knew was coming. Her previous lovers hadn’t been exactly endowed, but Jack had taken more than his fair portion in that department.

  He gripped the steel-hard flesh, running the thickly crested head through the honey-rich slit before it.

  “Fuck, you’re hot,” he groaned as he tucked it at her opening. “Hot and wet and so very, very greedy.”

  “Oh God, Jack, have mercy.” Her hands fisted in the blankets beneath her as the head began to press into her. Her head thrashed, stars glittering behind her closed eyelids as she felt him separating her, slowly, so very slowly she thought she would die from it.

  “You’re so tight, Angel-mine,” he whispered as he gripped her behind the thighs, holding her in place as the smooth flesh of his cock began to pierce her. “So tight and sweet, it’s enough to make a grown man cry in pleasure.”

  Her head tossed, her eyes fluttering as she fought to keep them open, fought to watch the slow impalement of her cunt.

  She couldn’t watch. She could only feel. Her eyes dazed and lifted to his, her body bowed, tension tightening it to a near breaking point as she felt him slowly, oh so very slowly, working his cock past the tight, tender tissue of her pussy.

  “Ye’ll kill me…” She was aware of the thickening of her accent, but could do nothing for it.

  “Fuck. Stay still, woman,” he growled as she twisted against him. “You’re so fucking tight I’m going to lose control any minute.”

  Yes, she wanted that. Needed it.

  “I’ll never survive this pace,” she cried out, frustration eating her alive. “For pity’s sake, Jack. Fuck me. Fuck me or kill me, whichever ye’ve decided to do. But do it right quick. No’ this slow.”

  “But I like slow, baby.” His hands tightened beneath her legs. “Slow and tight, feeling every sweet muscle in that tight little pussy gripping my cock.”

  His expression was a grimace of pleasure and arousal.

  A frustrated, agonized moan slipped past her throat as he filled her more. Mere inches, stretching her so deliciously, heating her, sending her blood pressure to the boiling point as she endured a pleasure never before imagined.

  She couldn’t take it. She needed more. Needed him deep and hard inside her.

  She clenched around the portion of his cock that was there. Stroking it with her inner muscles as she fought for an anchor in the tumultuous storm overtaking her. There had to be something, some way to at least hold on to her sanity. What minute portion of it he had left her with at this point.

  She knew the slow, fierce digs into her cunt were driving her past sanity. She needed to be filled, not teased to death.

  “You’re a demon, Jack Riley,” she accused him harshly as he kept his hesitant, teasing pace. “A torturous, arrogant demon.”

  “And you’re a witch. A black-haired, violet-eyed, hottest-fucking-pussy-I’ve-been-in witch,” he groaned, sinking in deeper as she gritted her teeth and fought to hold back the cry that escaped against her will.

  “Son of a bitch, Angel…” The desperate curse heralded a sudden hard push that gave her more. Then more.

  “Yes. Oh yes, Jack. All of it. I need it all.” She was gasping, fighting to press closer, to feel every inch stretching her wide.

  Until he pulled back.

  Baring her teeth in a snarl, Angel arched then forced herself forward, her hands gripping his shoulders as she came astraddle his hard thighs, then forced herself onto the hard wedge of male muscle tormenting her.

  Her keening cry echoed in the air around her as she felt him fill her, the head butting into her very cervix as her teeth gripped his shoulder like an animal in heat. His hard hands now gripped her buttocks, clenching in the soft flesh there as she felt his cock throbbing hard and heavy inside her.

  Her knees clasped his thighs, her feet pressing into the mattress as she began to ride her cowboy. Moving up until only the crest remained inside her hungry pussy before sliding back down in an erotic dance that had the breath slamming from her throat and pleasure overwhelming her.

  “Save a horse, ride a cowboy,” she whispered before nipping his ear and clenching on the invader with a tight, caressing grip.

  She wasn’t anticipating his reaction.

  Before she could do more than gasp he was moving. He slammed her back on the bed at the same time his cock slammed into her pussy and he gave her what she had been pleading for. Hard, driving, fierce strokes that drove her headlong into the storm swirling within her body.

  He fucked her like the demon she had sworn he was. Holding on to her, his cock shuttling in and out in a rapid, destructive pace that had her tightening, clenching, rapidly ascending a peak that alternately terrified and exhilarated her.

  She stared up at him, dazed, feeling the fires swirling in her veins as her legs lifted, clasping his hips, opening herself further for the tumultuous invasion.

  “Harder,” she panted, feeling it, the orgasm she knew would change her forever. “Harder, Jack. Fuck me harder … harder…”

  He gave her harder. He gave her deeper. Shafting her with a ferocity that had her screaming, exploding, dying in his arms as the flames consumed her.

  Angel was only distantly aware of his release, the feel of his semen shooting inside her, prolonging the orgasm tearing her apart as she shuddered beneath him. Her arms and legs surrounded him, refusing to let him go as he finally stilled against her. Glowing aftershocks repeatedly shook her frame, leaving her breathless, astounded.

  Such pleasure should not exist. It was destructive to the mind. It was destructive to the heart. The one part of herself she swore she wouldn’t lose, she feared was the first part to go.

  “Ah, Jack, if only…” She whispered the words at his ear as he moved from her grip, falling to his side and pulling her against him. “If only…”

  If only ye were mine …

  *

  Jack came a
wake in a rush, certain Angel was gone, that the pleasure he’d had was only in his dreams. Sitting up in the bed, he met those violet eyes as she walked slowly from the bathroom, a towel held tight around her body.

  “Damn, I hope you don’t wake up like that on a regular basis,” she snorted, irritation flashing in her eyes. “You nearly scared me to death, jumping like that.”

  He blinked, feeling his chest clench as he watched her.

  Ignoring the feeling, he snorted at her comment, moving from the bed as he checked the time on the clock.

  Nearly four. How long had he slept anyway?

  “I’m surprised you’re still here.” He moved from the bed, scratching his chest before stretching the sleep from his limbs.

  She tilted her head and shrugged. “Beats jail.”

  Jack shot her a sharp look. Did she mean it? Hell, no, she didn’t. He wasn’t falling for that shit. She had met the heat, the wildness that reared inside him perfectly. That was not an unwilling lover, giving in to a fate little better than another that could await her.

  She smiled. An all-too-innocent smile that didn’t cover the feminine knowledge in her eyes. Damn her. She had been making him crazy for too long. The time he had spent between her thighs earlier wasn’t near enough to make up for the many weeks she had been making him crazy at her father’s estate.

  “Tell me about the torque.” He moved to the dresser, pulling out clean clothes as he glanced over his shoulder.

  She shrugged her bare shoulders. “It was gift from an ancient Celtic priest to an English warrior who was set to wed the priest’s favorite daughter. Even though the warrior was given orders to kill all the priests, still, he stayed his hand to bring peace with the bride he’d wed and the people he would rule. As long as the torque remains within my line, it’s promised that we’ll always know happiness and love in the marriage bed and the lands…” She swallowed tightly. “The family would always remain prosperous. Should it ever be taken away, then the blessing placed upon us goes away as well.”

  He shifted uncomfortably. Marriage he could do without. He didn’t want marriage. Then he looked at her again, remembered her in his bed, and frowned at the unfamiliar surge of longing that struck his chest.

  What had she once said about a woman who would love him? One who would greet him, knowing his needs, his hungers? The pleasure of loving and being loved?

  Hell, no. No marriage.

  Besides, he doubted she would give up her nice cushy life in Ireland to be a rancher’s wife. He had decided while on the Manning estate that his days of traveling, buying, and selling were coming to an end. He was tired of traveling, of never sleeping in a bed he called his own.

  “A piece of jewelry doesn’t make a good marriage,” he finally grumbled. “It’s the people.”

  “I agree.” She shrugged, her voice quiet. “But the blessing could make certain that those two meant to be together, come together. Whichever. Fact or legend. It’s the one piece of our family that we have left from centuries of history. A piece that has passed from mother to daughter since it was given to the first warrior.”

  “Then why mother to daughter?” His tone was a shade mocking, and he knew it.

  “Because it was given to the husband of the female of that land. Not the son. But as I said, that is beside the fact. Father had no rights to sell it. Mother’s early death prevented her from making the will she had planned, leaving the torque to me upon her death. Though their joint will left it to me upon Father’s death. And the estate in my care. Should I decide to sell or no longer remain in Ireland, then my brothers would be given stewardship of it.”

  “The estate is worth plenty,” he pointed out.

  “The torque is worth just as much to me, if not more.” She stared back at him, her violet eyes filled with emotion. “I’ll let it go eventually, Jack. There’s no sense in rubbing salt into the wound now.”

  He grunted, moving for the shower rather than replying to her comment.

  “Don’t bother dressing,” he warned her as he passed. “I won’t be long.”

  NINE

  Arrogant ass. As though she had any of her clothing to dress in. Though if she did have anything clean, she would have definitely put it on just to spite him, she thought nearly twenty minutes later as she stood in the kitchen, dressed only in another of his T-shirts.

  She was hungry. And she refused to cook naked. It just wasn’t going to happen.

  As she pulled eggs and omelet ingredients from the refrigerator, she frowned, wondering at his strange behavior before he disappeared into the shower. What would it matter to him where the torque came from, or the legends behind it?

  It mattered to her. She might have hoped the legends were true, that the torque could lead such a man to her, but it wasn’t just that. She loved the thought of all the centuries of happiness it had seen, had been part of. To have come from a man believed to be one of the most powerful Druids to have lived, created and empowered to protect the child he loved and the daughters of her line. It was the very heart of love.

  For a very short time she’d wondered if the torque had brought Jack to her life with its power. She’d hoped, because her reaction to him was so odd, that he would be hers. That he could love.

  Still, he had grown on her. She had enjoyed sparring with him, rebuffing him only to see what new game he would come back with. It was exciting, titillating; it had kept her arousal and her intellect challenged as no other man ever could.

  But he had taken the torque. Despite her furious pleas, he had bought something that was priceless to her and taken it from her. He had taken the one thing left of the glorious past her ancestors had lived and loved through.

  “You dressed.” His voice was dark, forbidding as he stepped into the kitchen.

  Angel placed the first omelet on its plate and poured the second into the pan.

  “So I did.” She glanced at him over her shoulder, once again seeing his features in the fuzzy image of her dream lover.

  He was going to break her heart and she knew it. She could feel it in the vague, hollow ache in her chest, and she hated it. Despite her determination to hold her heart from him, he had taken it as easily as he had the torque.

  How was that? she wondered. He had stolen the torque. Had purchased it. It had been no gift, it had not come to him through their marriage …

  Yet neither had it come to its first wearer in such a way. She remembered the legend of the first bearer of the torque. The English warrior who had been gifted the emblem by the father of a conquered maid. A peace offering. A promise …

  She shook the thought away. This wasn’t centuries past, this was here and now, and Jack wasn’t an English lord, nor was he a conqueror or a warrior. He was a cowboy, one with a gift for acquiring things that should have never been his. Things such as her torque … and her heart.

  She slid the second omelet to a plate and then placed both on the small round kitchen table along with silverware. Turning back to the counter, she poured two large mugs of coffee and set them by the plates before taking her seat.

  The feel of the cool wood against her bare rear was a shock. She drew in a deep breath, sighed at the distraction, then picked up her fork.

  “You can eat or you can fume because I’m not flashing body parts for your pleasure. Doesn’t make a difference to me, I’m going to eat,” she informed him coolly, refusing to turn to look at him.

  “You’re a stubborn woman.” He made it sound like a curse.

  “I consider it one of my better qualities.” She lifted a bite to her lips, inhaled the aroma, then devoured it. Sex with Jack made her hungry.

  Another of those male snorts sounded behind her before he moved around her to the opposite seat and the plate awaiting him.

  He looked more amused than displeased with her.

  Silence reigned as they both ate, though Angel could feel the tension growing between them.

  “I have to return tomorrow,” she finally announced as she s
tood and collected the empty plates.

  “You mean if the sheriff lets you?” He lifted a brow mockingly.

  “Sheriff or no, I have no choice.” She shrugged indifferently. “I haven’t moved to America, Jack, I was only visitin’.”

  She turned back, her gaze moving to the window and the land outside it. It appeared barren, scruffy, but there was a beauty within it that she hadn’t expected to see, a beauty she feared she would miss when she returned to Ireland.

  He leaned back in his chair, a frown crossing his face. “Forget it. I’m not ready for you to leave yet.”

  She smiled at his stubbornness, shaking her head as his arrogance reared its head. He was really quite charming, even when he frowned like that.

  “Then in the morning, I suggest you notify the sheriff of my attempted theft of your property. Because by afternoon, I will be gone. This isn’t my home.”

  So why was regret eating at her soul?

  “And you think two nights is enough to make up for the near month of hell you put me through while I was trapped on that estate of yours?” he growled, rising to his feet. “I don’t think so, little witch.”

  “Angel,” she corrected him, her smile mockingly innocent. “Remember?”

  He crossed his arms over his bare chest. “I want a month.”

  “You’re a big boy, Jack. Your wants won’t hurt you.” But some of hers did. Because she didn’t want to leave. She wanted to stay with a strength that actually made her chest ache.

  He made her ache. Just staring at him, seeing not only the incredibly sexy male body, but the man as well. The one who made her laugh, made her scream in frustration, and made her hotter, wetter than any man ever had, than she knew any other man ever would.

  “You’re not leaving.”

  His declaration was a surprise. The frustrated look on his face was even more so, as though he had surprised himself with the words as much as he had surprised her.

  She adopted his stance, crossing her arms beneath her breasts and watching him with curious amusement. He rather looked like a little boy not getting his way. It was oddly cute. Exasperating, but cute nonetheless.