Native Wolf (26 page)

But now that he’d made that plunge, he realized he’d made a grave mistake. They were flesh to flesh, their hearts pounding with the thrill of danger, their mouths inches apart.

Like a salmon swimming into a net, he was trapped and there was no way out.

Her eyes, lit by the reflections coming off the water, flickered like green fire. Her lips, parted and trembling, begged to be kissed. And he longed to lap up every drop of water that slipped down her cheek.

Her body was as soft and slippery as wet moss against him, and she smelled like the creek—fresh, clean, and earthy. She’d stopped squirming in his grasp, and he could see her rapid pulse in her throat.

As if drawn there by force, his gaze lowered. Beneath the clear water, her breasts were pale and beautiful, the tips puckered with cold. Against his will, he moved his hand up to cup one of the lovely orbs, to warm it with his palm.

She sighed, and her eyes drifted close. He lowered his head and grazed her lips with his own, once, twice.

Her mouth was sweet and yielding at first, but rapidly became hungry and demanding. She wrapped her arms around his neck and deepened the kiss, sighing against his cheek.

Lost in lust, he let his other hand drift down her back until he cradled her bottom and lifted her up against him, against that part of him that bulged with longing despite the icy water.

She moaned against his mouth and tangled her fingers in his hair, slipping the tip of her tongue out to taste his lips.

He answered with his own tongue, tilting his head to delve into the tender recesses of her mouth, and moved his hand from her breast down past the curve of her hip, nudging her closer.

Her buttocks felt smooth, ripe, and supple in his palms, and he gave them a slow, gentle squeeze that made her gasp in pleasure.

But it was what she did next that threatened to send him over the edge into an abyss of desire. Weightless in the water, she lifted her legs and wrapped them brazenly around his waist, pressing her core against his belly with wanton, purposeful need.

Claire almost sobbed with rapture at the sensation. Everywhere his skin touched hers, it felt as if rays of sunlight kissed her, a shocking contrast to the cold water lapping at her back. And now that she’d tasted desire, that aching spot between her legs craved what he’d given her before. She squeezed tightly against him, drawing him nearer, seeking an unattainable closeness.

He groaned deep in his throat. Whether it was in pleasure or pain, she wasn’t sure, but the sound sent a lusty thrill through her.

Then, all at once, with a growl of frustration, he disengaged from her, dislodged her legs, and hefted her up in one arm, slogging up the muddy bank.

Of course, she realized. It was probably awkward to make love in the water. And that was surely what he intended to do. Once he set her down before him, she could see the obvious evidence of his need straining at his trousers.

With a seductive smile, she leaned toward him and moved her hand down his chest, past his stomach, toward the firm staff that beckoned for her touch.

His lips tightened, and he grunted, but she paid no heed. She brazenly stroked the outside of his wet jeans, shivering as she felt desire as hard as oak under her hand. He wanted her. And she wanted him.

Last night, while she’d reveled in unbridled contentment, he'd reined in his lust. Now he suffered. He hungered. Why should she not grant him the same release, the same rapture he'd given her?

She unfastened the first button of his trousers.

Pulling back with a sharp inhale, he snatched her wrist. “No.”

Claire hesitated. “No?”

“Don’t do it, Claire.” Chase had to force the words from his throat like a canoe through mud, for he sure as hell didn't want to say them. He burned for her, and he needed to cast himself into her crucible.

"Why?" she said softly.

Her question was innocent enough, but it released a torrent of moral arguments in his head, adding to the emotional storm already brewing there.

Why? There were too many reasons to count. Which one would she accept? Which one would she believe? Should he tell her he'd already taken enough from her? Should he explain that he could offer her no future? Should he mention her father? Her fiancé? Should he describe what they would do to him if they found out?

He swept up his shirt from the rocks and covered her with it. It was difficult enough keeping a level head without having to look at all that tantalizing flesh.

“You keep forgetting who I am,” he said. “I’m your kidnapper, your father’s worst enemy.”

"I don't care,” she said, clutching his shirt to her bosom. “It feels like we're supposed to be together." She gave him a shaky smile. "Don't you feel that?"

"Our feelings don’t matter. And you can’t be so certain we belong together. We’re almost strangers."

"Strangers?" Claire's brows shot up. "I'd hardly let a stranger...do..." She lowered her eyes and her voice. "What you did to me last night."

His nostrils flared at the memory, and his chest rose and fell with a deep breath.

"Please don't take me back home, Chase," she begged. "Not yet."

"What's the difference if it's tomorrow or the next day?" he asked. "You'll go back."

"I don't want to."

"But you will."

"No," she insisted. She clenched his upper arm in desperation, and his muscle tightened at her touch. "I want to run away with you."

He scowled. "It isn't like in your books," he warned her. "In white men's stories, there is always a 'happily ever after.' That's not so in the real world."

"What about your parents? They ran away together. Aren't they living happily ever after?"

"They ran away because the miners beat up my father and the tribe was going to kill their babies." He sighed. "It wasn't easy for my mother, having no friends, no family."

Claire flashed him an injured frown. "I think you’re only saying that because you don't want me."

He stared at her in rapt disbelief. How could she imagine that? Did she not notice the blatant bulge of his trousers?

“Claire,” he said, adding the endearment, “
whililyo.
I’ve never wanted anyone more.” He furrowed his hair with his hand. “This is my fault. I never meant to hurt you. But you don’t belong to me. You belong to someone else. I can’t be…kissing…another man’s woman.”

“But I’m not—”

“It’s bad enough that I kidnapped you,” Chase continued, lowering his head in shame. “Worse that I compromised you. I can’t return you…” There was no delicate way to say it, “damaged.”

She stepped close again and placed a hand on his chest. “But that’s just it. Don’t you see? I don’t want to be returned at all.”

He gave her a sad smile. “You have to go home. Your father will worry. Your fiancé will worry. Your aunt in Chico will worry.”

“No!” she blurted. “No, they won’t.”

“Of course they will.”

She guiltily averted her eyes. “Not…really.”

He crossed his arms over his chest and gave her a dubious scowl.

She caught the corner of her lip under her teeth. “What I said before…about my aunt…I made it up.” She gulped. “All of it.”

His frown deepened.

“I wasn’t visiting an aunt in Chico. I don’t even
have
an aunt in Chico,” she quietly admitted, adding in a mumble, “or, for that matter, an aunt.”

So she’d lied to him? Or maybe she was lying now. He had sisters—he knew what tricksters women could be. Sometimes it was impossible to tell when they were speaking the truth. “Go on.”

“The truth is I was running away from home.” She glanced up to see how he was taking this news. He kept his expression carefully blank. “That very night I intended to leave. I left my father a note saying I was running away, that I was breaking off my engagement to Frank. So you see? He won’t even be looking for me. Nobody will.”

Under his crossed arms, his heartbeat quickened hopefully. Was it possible they weren’t being pursued? Did no one know she’d been taken against her will? Did Claire
not
belong to another man?

All of this might be true, but he knew better than to listen to his foolish heart. After all, ladies’ minds were changeable. Broken engagements could be easily repaired and often were.

“You’re a runaway bride,” he said.

‘Runaway bride’ sounded so harsh to Claire’s ears, and it wasn’t quite true. That wasn’t the only reason she’d left. “Not exactly. I mean…I don’t love Frank. I guess I never have. But I was running away because…because my father…” What could she say? That her father had never really been capable of loving her after her mother died? That Claire was a source of constant disappointment to him? That, with Yoema gone, there was nothing left for her in Paradise? “My father doesn’t approve of me.”

“Because you dance with the Indians.”

That made a smile tug at her lips. “Maybe. But I don’t want to go back there. I can’t go back. I won’t marry a man I don’t love. And I won’t be a burden to a father who’s ashamed of me.” Then she took a shuddering breath and stated the stark truth. “If you don’t take me with you, I guess I’ll…I’ll find somewhere else to go. But I won’t go back to Frank, and I won’t go back to Paradise. I just won’t.”

She expected Chase would immediately assure her that of course he would take her with him. After all, he couldn’t leave her to fend for herself—not the spirit daughter of his grandmother. It was partly his responsibility that she was in this predicament, and it would be ungentlemanly of him not to offer a hand to help her out of it.

But to her chagrin, he gave her no such assurances at all. Instead, he tried to convince her yet again to go home.

“No one can force you to marry,” he said. “Women break off engagements all the time.”

That was true. If she
did
break things off with Frank, she might have to suffer the scorn of the townsfolk. But that was nothing new.

“And you’re a grown woman,” he continued. “You don’t need your father’s approval.”

That was also true. It was foolish to yearn for something she’d never had and never
would
have.

“You’re a wealthy and beautiful woman,” he said. “There are many white men who can offer you a good life.”

“I don’t want just any white man,” she finally realized. “I don’t want anyone but you.”

He shook his head, baffled. “You would leave your home, give up that fancy house? You must have trunks full of clothes and great stores of food, servants at your beck and call and suitors falling at your feet. What more could you want? You have everything here.”

“Everything?” She clasped his forearm then and looked deep into his eyes, her gaze softening as she spoke to his spirit. “No, I don’t have everything. All the pretty dresses in the world wouldn’t make me feel as beautiful as I do in this blacksmith’s shirt. Sunday roast at the Parker Ranch will never rival the rabbit you cooked for me over the campfire. And I’ll never sleep as soundly in my feather bed as I’ve slept in your arms. Things…are just…things.” She placed her hand flat against his chest, against his heart. “This. This is what’s important.”

How she talked him out of his trousers, he didn't know. How she convinced him that this was the right thing to do, he couldn't say. But suddenly it seemed like they were the only two who existed in this sacred place that so much reminded him of the garden in his mother’s Bible.

By the time Claire spread his cotton shirt on the flat rock and reclined in timid invitation—her bare skin gleaming like pearls in the sunlight, her eyes glazed with need—it was too late for him to change his mind. The beast had been unleashed.

“Come to me,” she softly asked.

How could he refuse such a sweet request? His body ached for her. His thoughts, however, were centered on one goal. He knew he must temper his lust for fear of hurting her again. She seemed so small and fragile. And he felt so big and clumsy.

He stretched out on his side next to her, and the moment he gazed into her trusting eyes, his concerns vanished. A sense of rightness overcame him. He suddenly felt that this place, this woman, this moment were perfect and always meant to be. By some miracle, despite a star-crossed, crooked, rife-with-peril journey, he’d landed smack in the middle of his life’s path, where he was intended to be.

A faint breeze blew past him, taking his cares with it. His spirit was being guided now. There was nothing to fear.

“Kiss me,” Claire purred, lowering her eyes to his mouth and licking her lips.

He had neither the will nor the desire to resist her. Weaving his fingers into her wet hair, he turned her head toward his and lowered his mouth.

Their caress was tender and heartfelt. A warm glow enveloped him as their souls seemed to sing together. She sighed into his mouth, and he whispered against her lips.

She raised her hands to cup his jaw, drawing him deeper into the kiss, lightly brushing his cheeks with her thumbs and running the tip of her tongue across his upper lip.

He lifted her head in the cradle of his hands, protecting her from the hard stone as his tongue trespassed gently into her mouth, tasting her desire.

She moaned softly. He drew carefully back, leaving a delicate trail of kisses from the corner of her mouth, across her cheek, to the delicious spot beneath her ear.

She writhed in pleasure and made fists in his hair as he murmured against her ear.
“Medindin’ung?
Do you want this?”

She arched up in response, but he needed to make sure. Freeing one of his hands, he ran a fingertip down the side of her neck, making her shiver, traced her collarbone, and then moved the flat of his palm lightly over her bosom to graze the peak of her breast.

Claire squeezed her eyes shut and sipped in a shuddering breath. The contrast of the cold, clinging droplets and the warm bath of sunlight sent quivers of delight through her. But the shock of his callused hand upon her sensitive skin was earth-shaking.

She knew what she wanted next. She lowered her hands to stroke his broad shoulders, aroused by the firm and supple muscles that flexed there as he moved. She applied pressure there, urging him downward, and he complied, kissing her throat, her shoulder, her collar bone.