by Cait London
Silver awoke to the scents of smoke and coffee and Nick’s essence, blended with her own. She sniffed delicately and the scent of their lovemaking curled around her. Sunshine stabbed at her lids and she squeezed them shut. She sniffed lightly, catching sunflowers and sunlight. She lay still, absorbing the different essences —pine, cedar, juniper, rich earth, grasses.
She stretched delicately, her body aching slightly. The male chuckle caused her eyes to open and she flattened as she looked up at Nick, crouching beside her. A sunflower spilled from her hair to her nose and tumbled down her cheek. Nick caught it and dusted it across her nose.
“You were smiling in your sleep. You seemed quite pleased with yourself,” he said as she jerked the sleeping bag up to her chin.
“Now, look, Nick—” she began, unable to collect just exactly what she could say... she’d planned on returning to her bedroll and she was in his. She took a second look at Nick-in-themorning: bare chest, droplets of water gleaming on his shoulders, wide red suspenders striping his dark skin, jeans opened at the snap—
The narrowed, hungry look in his eyes stopped her from speaking. His hand wrapped around her nape and he bent to kiss her shockingly, hungrily, fully, and when he released her, the heat and possession in his brilliant jade eyes took her breath away. He half lifted her and the sleeping bag until her back was braced against a log. “Stop sulking, sweetheart. You had me last night. My honor has been compromised. You’ve seduced me, quite nicely.”
She looked at the coffee cup he’d just placed into her hand and the freshly baked biscuits, buttered and jammed, on her lap. There was no retreating...she gathered the sleeping bag against her body—and since she was naked, she couldn’t deny she’d come to him. Nick’s cocky, devastating grin nettled her. She bit into the fluffy biscuit, damned it for being delicious, just like the man who looked extremely pleased with himself. She downed the hot coffee, burned her lip and damned him for looking so appealing, her body quivering with the sight of all that tanned chest beneath his opened shirt. “You were having a nightmare. I merely comforted you.”
He laughed outright, the sound rich and carefree and enchanting. “Try again. You wanted me. Admit it.”
She eyed him, nettled that he’d cut straight to the truth that she’d wanted him. “Is this going to be a dissection the morning after? How boring.”
“Ah! The jaded approach. That’s very good, but predictable. Don’t forget I’ve seen you at your best, that first day we met—the cranberry silk witch, furious and impatient.” He skimmed his hand over her hair, grinned as though delighted, then sipped his coffee. “What are we hunting today?”
“We?”
“You’re after something. I said I’d help.”
“Fragrances. Mountain violets. Wildflowers,” she lied airily. “Nothing that would interest you. You may leave.”
There was nothing friendly about Nick’s shielded glance at her. “Not a chance. I came to get you...to be with you.”
“Get you... ” The phrase sent an icy chill skidding around her warm body, her senses prickling. She decided to attack, get his temper hiking, and he’d leave soon enough. “You realize that I’m uncomfortable with this conversation.”
He grinned again, the boyish, playful look stunning and delighting her. His hand ran across her head again, the gesture friendly and almost brotherly.
In the next instant, he reached for the plate and cup, setting them aside. One tug took the zipper down an inch, and Nick whispered, “Let me look at you.”
She launched herself at him, protecting her life, her dreams, her goals, and Nick easily captured her wrists, his gaze locked with hers. He carefully examined her wrists, arms and shoulders. “I won’t look at you, unless you want me to. Do you?”
Wary of him, she sensed his fear and disgust and knew her fear of sharing anything with him. “Why?”
“Bruises. Because I’m afraid I hurt you, past what was necessary your first time,” he said too rawly, as if the pain had been locked inside him for years. “Will you let me look at you?”
Silver’s hot flush moved from her toes up to her head. Once again Nick was asking her for more than she’d given anyone. He’d had his share of bruises and pain, and she couldn’t let him think he’d hurt her. Slowly, one by one, she eased her wrists from his hands and lowered the zipper. “I’m fine. Look.”
It was no easy matter, exposing her body, but to reassure Nick, she would. Silver fought the quick heat rising up her throat to her cheeks.
Nick stroked her hot cheeks and she looked away, shy of him, as he eased away the flannel-lined sleeping bag. He looked slowly down her body, his open hand skimming her shoulders, her breasts, her stomach and thighs, her legs down to her feet.
“Turn.”
She obeyed and cold air met her backside, Nick’s hand warm, cruising down her back, her bottom, her thighs and calves. She turned again and found his frown. “I’m fine, Nick.”
“I’m sorry I hurt you, sweetheart.” Satisfied, he shuddered, folding the cloth over her body again, and closed his eyes, a muscle contracting in his cheek.
Too vulnerable now, appearing lonely, his past wrapped around him, Nick needed warmth and—Silver’s hand stretched out to lie along his jaw. She ached for the pain in his expression, for the brutal past that haunted him. “Nick, you didn’t hurt me.”
“It was more than I expected, making love with you,” he admitted, pressing his face into her palm. his vulnerable shudder flowing into her keeping. “More. I’m a controlled man.... I’ve been very careful with women, with how I felt, even during sex, and I hadn’t expected—what you gave me. Thank you.”
“You’re not like your father, Nick.” She couldn’t bear to have him ache because of the beauty they’d shared.
“Aren’t I?” he asked dryly, sadly. “With you, I wonder.”
“If I knew what the hell we were looking for, it would help.” The man hanging from a climbing rope beside Silver as they rappelled down the face of a red stone cliff wasn’t in a good mood.
“Daisies,” she muttered, and wondered how a man who could be so sweet the morning after, who could make her stir to magic with lovemaking and tender words, could be so ill-tempered now.
He caught her ankle, planted her boot on a safe ledge and snarled up at her. “Get up on that ledge. We’ve been down two cliffs today. You’ve got skinned knees and hands and you need food, and if you kill us, I’m really going to raise hell. Mamie will do that twisting ear thing and make me feel lower than mud. Rafe and Joel will invite me into a brawl—they’re nasty in a fight, and as the youngest, I always got the worst of it. On top of that, I don’t feel much like a groom right now.”
She grasped a root, tested it and swung onto a sizable rock ledge and stared at Nick as he laboriously made his way up to her. Heavier than she, he had to test each outcropping carefully. Silver studied Nick’s scowl. “What are you muttering about?”
“My honor, lady.” With a powerful movement, Nick hitched himself up onto the ledge. He calmly opened a canteen of water and drizzled it upon her head. She swatted the sunlit droplets away and Nick grinned down at her. His kiss, quick, hot and hungry, stunned her. While she was floundering, he ripped a scarlet flower from its rock-bound stalk and tucked it into the front of her shirt. His thumb ran down her breast, brushed the peak of her nipple, and his look changed into wicked, sultry, tropical heat. “You’ve got beautiful breasts, sweetheart.”
His familiarity with her body caused Silver to flatten against the stone wall behind her, her knees weakened at the look in Nick’s eyes as he flipped open one button of her shirt. “Blushes become you. You’ve got that wild and smoky look, desperate and frustrated. I like it, because I know I’m in there somewhere, revving you up. Let me look at you.”
She scanned the jutting rocks above them, and the depth of the canyon below, and tried to stop her heart from racing, her body from melting. “Nick?”
One quick look down his body told her that Nick
wanted her. She fought the hot blush rising to her cheeks, the way her skin ignited when he looked at her. His scent curled around her, familiar but wary, clanging, exotic, dangerous and very hungry.
Nick glared at her. “I wasn’t sleeping. You said yes and I’ve been looking forward to the excited bride-to-be chitchat. You know... the wedding date, arrangements, that sort of thing—”
“Let’s talk about this,” she began when she could start thinking again. She backed away from him, trying to find safety when one look at Nick took her breath away. “First of all, I admit to nothing. We only met two and a half weeks ago—”
He lifted a dark eyebrow, mocking her. “I will not offend my grandmother by seducing a Tallchief woman. We’re getting married. There was that ‘yes.’ Several of them.”
Silver stared at him, recognizing the hard negotiator in Nick. “You were keeping a checklist?”
“I wanted to make certain that you knew exactly what you were committing to. You had every chance to back out. I wouldn’t have forced you.”
“What do you mean, it was a first for you?”
Nick scanned the clear blue Wyoming sky, the jutting red cliffs dotted with white bighorn sheep, and the valley below, the tiny herd of deer grazing on the rich grass. “I think I’m feeling fragile today, thanks to you. I’ve never come close to an innocent—which you were—and I’ve never stayed the night. Until you, I was beginning to think that my sex drive—it’s been over five years since I’ve been with a woman, Silver, and a virgin in my sleeping bag assured me that all my equipment knew exactly what you were designed for...for loving. You slept very well, by the way. No tossing and turning and crying. You’re a cuddler, all arms and legs tangling with mine. I didn’t appreciate the sharp knee jabs, but I’ll get used to protecting myself.”
She could have pushed him over the cliff. “I am experimenting with my sexuality. The scents of lovemaking. I may duplicate them. You were there, I took you. Think of it this way—I’m a Tallchief, you were on my land and I took you.”
“This experiment is feeling delicate,. I’m not a trophy and you’re not a female knight with sexual rights to men on your ancestral property. Try again.” He narrowed his eyes and wrapped his hand around her wrist. “You trusted me with your body, but not your dreams. What are you looking for?”
“Peace,” she returned simply, truthfully, as memories of Jasmine came hurling at her. “And you’re not it.”
“He’ll be a fine beast of a man, haughty and proud and strong as a bear, gnawing at the maiden’s shields, testing her, claiming her with wicked eyes...
She wrapped her arms around herself, scanning the small canyon nearby. She’d find the pearls and she’d be free—Jasmine...
Nick slowly lifted the canteen to pour a stream of cold water over her head. Ripped from her dark thoughts by the tall intruder next to her, Silver licked a drop from her upper lip and steamed, wondering where she should hit him first. Then calmly, glaring at her, Nick poured the cold water over his own head. When he looked so fierce, the droplets clung to his head and eyebrows, dripping from his nose, Silver found herself laughing.
Slowly Nick’s expression changed into a devastating grin and sunlight danced around them like magic. “I like it when you laugh,” he murmured, tipping up her chin with his finger to give her a light, lovely, enchanting kiss.
With her lips against his, Silver asked, “Did you mean everything you said last night?”
“Every word.”
“Tell me again.” She had to know if the magic had happened.
Instead, Nick slowly unbuttoned her shirt, eased her T-shirt above her breasts. He cupped the softness of one in his hand, treasuring her and then slowly bent to take the hardened tip into his lips—
The image of his dark skin against her pale softness, his lashes closed and brushing her skin, his hair waving upon her body, matched the aching pleasure his mouth gave her.
Seven
Nick fought the groan curling out of him as he sat by the campfire. He ached from his head to his toes, every muscle locked in pain. He glanced at the woman devouring the meal he’d cooked, busily licking her fingers as butter dripped from the hot camp biscuits. Butter glistened on her chin as she reached for another quail roasting on the spit, tearing into it with an appreciative “Mmm. This is great. Yum. Baked potatoes and com on the cob. I’ll get fat.”
Nick almost groaned again when her agile little tongue flicked away a crumb on her bottom lip. She’d never get fat, not at the pace she’d moved today. Silver had scaled the cliffs of Tallchief Mountain effortlessly, leaping over rocks and tumbling streams, and peering into caves. She’d gathered wildflowers from the meadows, enchanting him as she studied the petals, bruising them. Once he’d lost her, and the branches of a cedar had moved as she burst from them, exclaiming about the beautiful scents as she wrapped her arms around the branches. She smelled everything from flowers to grasses to trees.
A woman moving with feline grace while every muscle in his body felt like a rock grating on pain was annoying. The pleasure of watching her wallow in the scents of Tallchief Mountain had stunned him. The deer and animals of the mountain had fascinated her, and she had wept at the Tallchiefs’ family cemetery, a meadow studded with Scottish heather.
While Nick fought another groan as he reached for the coffeepot, his muscles protesting, Silver rose easily to her feet and stretched her arms out to the night sky. She jogged in place and spun around, arms lifted again. “This is wonderful. Beautiful. I could stay here forever. The scents are fabulous. Let’s build a sweat lodge. We can use sagebrush for scent in the smoke and—Nick, there is no reason to glare at me. You may leave at any time.”
“Wouldn’t think of it.” He attempted a cold, calculating smile, baring his teem. He should have come up with a romantic reason why he stayed with her. The image of Silver swinging from an aspen limb and agilely hefting herself up to a branch to get a better view caused him to shudder. Even his butt hurt. Nick considered Silver’s shapely backside, almost felt it undulating in his palms...and he went hard.
He was in good shape, a man built for strength and endurance, not aerobic, agile exercise. Women usually took him very seriously. He ticked off his pluses: he was appealing, charming...a perfect catch...and in pretty good shape. He wanted to be the object of Silver’s predatory instincts.
She peered across the campfire’s drifting smoke. “You’ve been in a snit all day. You’ve been glowering at me for the past hour. You are a very good cook, Nick. Thank you. You are appreciated. I’ll do the dishes.”
Nick stealthily, slowly, rubbed his hot coffee cup up and down his aching thighs. Pleasantries wouldn’t soothe his bruised ego. He settled down for an unfamiliar but necessary sulk, nettled by the woman he wanted to capture and marry. Last night had proven that Silver was his alone, and he’d wanted to comfort her today. He’d had visions of lying her down in the mountain meadows and telling her more of his heart—those delicate little moments a man wanted from his love.
Instead, she felt “wonderful,” fully charged and ready to build a sweat lodge. Nick leaned back onto Montoya’s saddle, sipping his coffee and wondered how to take off his boots for the night. His legs felt like logs, unable to bend. He slid a cautious glance at the woman effortlessly crouching and washing the cookware, leaving it to dry. The haphazard tumble of dishes resembled what Silver had done to his intentions to move deeper into their relationship and the commitment he wanted. Then there was that missing bridal chitchat that he had looked forward to hearing. He’d known he wanted to claim Silver, and he hadn’t moved too quickly. Silver was an impulsive woman and would know what she wanted—she hadn’t given him a “no way, José.” But she wasn’t exactly bubbling with the idea of being his wife. Instead, she “appreciated” his cooking. As one would “appreciate” an appliance, a dishwasher.
Silver glanced at him and smiled tenuously. She knelt at his feet, unlacing his boots and drawing them off, tending Nick, who couldn’t ben
d his legs without groaning. He who wanted to take Silver in his arms and make love to her. He doubted that possibility existed tonight. “I can do that myself.”
“Stop growling.” Her cropped hair gleamed coal black in the firelight, her breasts flowing softly beneath his borrowed T-shirt and worn flannel shirt. She arched and stretched, slid away the flannel shirt to replace it with the Tallchief tartan, smoothing it against her as she looked up into the stars. He wanted to place his lips on that smooth length of throat and—“Nick, do you really think the Tallchief legends are true?”
Shielded uncertainty and fear lurked in her question, and Nick studied her intently. Her reason for coming to Amen Flats and Tallchief Mountain was never far away. Whatever secret she hoarded was too painful to share with him. A man who had crawled his way out of filth and hunger, Nick did not believe in dreams and whims, he gave her what he could—“They have come true for the Tallchiefs and my brothers, who married Tallchief women.”
“I am a Tallchief woman. I’ve never felt so alive as today, seeing the crystal cave where Liam collected the crystals for Elizabeth.... I feel deeply that what I want is here. Sometimes the feelings are so strong that I know if I reach out, I can claim my ancestors’ talents, the seer and the shaman blood in me. In my heart, I know that every word written in Una’s journals and in Elizabeth’s are absolutely true.”
She glanced at Nick, then down at her hands, running her fingers over her palms as if tracing her thoughts. “I won’t hurt the Tallchiefs, Nick. But I can’t be a part of them. I don’t want to be a part of any family again, including my own. I do not intend to have children.”
She glanced at him again. “You’re angry, aren’t you? You’re an old-fashioned, macho male and—Nick, I think your biological clock is ticking. You’re surrounded by families and babies, and then Mamie is definitely pushing you to acquire me. You love her and you want to please her. You want the ones you love to be happy, even if it costs you your own happiness.”
