Tender Touch (22 page)

“Wait a minute. How’re things going here?” His eyes had lost the lightness of a moment before. They held a gravity now that told her something was up.

“Amos Shortfall and Sara Goodman are gone. They could have used you to help with the burying.”

Irked that he’d ignored her question, she followed him to the cook fire where he crouched to pour himself a cup of coffee.

When he rose to his feet, the steaming tin cup in his hand, he wasn’t more than a foot from her. If he leaned a bit closer, he could kiss her, but he was entirely too conscious of the Woody boys greasing the hubs of their wagon wheels a dozen yards away, and Fannie Goodman seated on the ground reading to the smaller children. Next door, Marc was clumsily patching a tear in his wagon cover. He settled for teasing her some more instead. “Maybe someday you’ll find I’m good for more than digging graves.”

She colored. In her embarrassment, she spoke without thinking. “I’ve always known that. You’re kind and warm and thoughtful . . .” Her voice trailed off as he grinned at her. The rose of her cheeks deepened as she realized he had duped her into exposing some of her feelings for him.

“How ’bout kissing?” He leaned closer, his eyes on her lips. “Am I good for kissing?”

With both hands she shoved him away, causing him to spill coffee down his shirt. “You’re incorrigible, Columbus Nigh.”

He chuckled as she stomped off, then cursed himself for letting his lust for her wipe more important matters from his mind. “Hold on, woman.”

“What now?” she growled as he caught up with her. He glanced around and lowered his voice as he spoke. “Barret Wight’s at the fort. Been showing around a likeness of you. Did what I could to slow him down, but I’d feel a sight better if we could put some distance be-tween him and us. Fast.”

“The daguerreotype. I never thought of him using that to track me down.” She gnawed her lower lip as she tried to think what to do. “The men have been fretting about the others getting so far ahead of us. With more wagons passing us every day, it’s going to be difficult to catch up. If they’re willing, I believe we could make those that are still sick comfortable enough to travel without suffering any harm.”

“I’ll talk to them. Stick close to camp. Use the chamber pot in the wagon if you have to, but don’t step foot outside the corral.”

Silent as a cat, he was gone. Brianna stayed where she was, working to control her mounting panic. The fort was only twelve and a half miles away, according to Marc’s calculations. Twelve and a half miles was all that separated her from Barret’s temper, Barret’s retribution. Would he lock her in the fruit cellar once he had her home? Would he destroy her clothes and make her go naked again? Or offer the use of her body to his friends as he’d threatened so often?

Her gaze strayed to Col’s tall, muscular figure, highlighted by the fire as he talked with Marc and the other men, his thumbs tucked in back of his wide beaded belt. She smiled, knowing without seeing it, that a toothpick dangled from between his lips. Gentle, demanding lips that haunted her nights. If Barret caught her, she would never see Columbus Nigh again. Suddenly she realized none of Barret’s promised punishments could compare to the pain of that.

The night aged quickly while Brianna tended to Violet and Taswell Woody, then Lucy and Lavinia Decker. The decision had been made. They would break camp at dawn—not far away now—and travel as fast as the crowded road would allow, in order to reunite with the Magrudge Company as soon as possible.

“Missus Villard?” Lucy Decke
r’s voice broke into Brianna’s thoughts. “Why hasn’t Col been in to see me? Is he afraid of getting sick?”

“Lucy!” her mother admonished. “It wouldn’t be proper for him to visit you in bed. You forget, young lady, the two of you aren’t engaged yet.”

“But we will be real soon, Mother. He wants to marry me, he as much as told me so.”

Brianna tried to scold herself for wishing Lucy had died instead of Lilith or Betsy, but the thought persisted. When she left the Decker wagon, her thoughts and emotions were so jumbled she forgot Col’s warning to stay in camp. She needed to be alone and think. It wasn’t until a hand snaked out of the darkness and clamped onto her arm that she realized her error.

Panicked, she screamed and fought, tearing at the viselike grip with her fingers and digging her heels into the ground as the man dragged her farther from the camp. He cursed and yanked hard. She stumbled to her knees. He grabbed both her wrists and jerked her back up. His features were mere shadows in the darkness, yet she knew it wasn’t Barret; the fingers wrapped around her wrists weren’t stubby enough. The knowledge gave her courage. She sank her teeth into one of his hands and tasted dirt.

“Damn you, you filthy slut!” He let go to backhand her across the face.

Brianna staggered backward from the blow, but her mind was working enough to know she was free. She caught herself, turned and ran. Through a gap between the wagons she saw Col standing with the other men. So close, so close. She opened her mouth for another scream, but the sound came out a strangled gasp as her assailant tackled her, throwing her to the ground.

He landed on top of her, his arms around her middle. One hand cradled a breast. Panting, he chuckled harshly in her ear as he squeezed her rounded flesh. “Didn’t expect no benefits like this when I promised your old man I’d bring you his message.”

Punch Moulton! Her stomach turned at the thought of having his hands on her. She could still see his fist slamming into Dulcie’s bruised face. He was nothing more than a younger version of Barret.

The instincts born of a hundred beatings took over.
Keep quiet. Don’t goad him. Show enough fear to placate. Don’t cry, don’t beg. Be invisible, a mere pebble in the grass. He can’t hurt a pebble
.

“Hey, whaddya say,
widow
woman?” he breathed sarcastically in her ear. “Reckon you been lettin’ that squawman diddle you. I know he ain’t your brother. So why not me, too?”

He was grinding his pelvis into her buttocks. Brianna realized she couldn’t simply lay there and let him have his way as she would have Barret. She wasn’t the same woman as the one who’d run away from St. Louis. And Punch Moulton wasn’t her husband.

If she could get him to let go of her for a moment, lull him into trusting her . . . Before he could do what he was proposing, he would have to let her turn over, and there were clothes to be gotten out of the way. Swallowing her revulsion, she said, “Like this?”

“Why not? Ain’t you never done it like a bitch in heat?” He lifted himself off of her enough to pull up her skirt. Taking advantage, Brianna swung back with her elbow as hard as she could and screeched for help.

His arm deflected the blow from her elbow as he fell, pinning her again beneath him. She bucked to throw him off. Wrapping his hand in the long tresses that had come loose from the knot at the back of her head, he yanked hard. She yelled again.

From the circle of wagons came the thud of running feet. Brianna spotted Col peering into the darkness, Marc and the Woody boys behind him.

“You cussed bitch, you keep your mouth shut if you want to live.” Punch’s cheek lay against hers. The stale whiskey odor of his breath filled her nostrils. The stubble on his jaw scraped her tender flesh. Panting, she lay still beneath him.

Nigh said something to the others, then stepped over the wagon tongue and vanished into the shadows.

“Damn,” Punch muttered, searching the darkness. Keeping his grip on her hair, he scrambled to his feet, drawing her up with him. His head jerked from side to side as he tried to pinpoint Nigh’s location. The click a pistol being cocked close by—too close—brought him to a halt. But he wasn’t ready to give in.

“Listen good,” he whispered. “Barret’s coming for you and if that squaw-screwing lover of yours is anywhere around when he gets here, Barret’s gonna put a bullet in him. Maybe you, too.”

Then he was gone.

A moment later Nigh was beside her, the pistol in his hand. “What happened? Was it Barret?”

She shook her head, unable to trust her voice yet. “Where did he go?”

“I don’t know, it’s too dark to see.”

He picked her up and carried her to the wagon, his eyes still searching the dark night. “Who was it?”

She didn’t dare tell him. Nigh would kill Punch and then go after Barret. She couldn’t risk Col getting killed, too. “A friend of Barret’s.”

“What’d he want?”

“He said Barret was coming for me, and . . . and I’d best be r
eady. You frightened him away.”

The rest of the message would have to remain her secret. No matter how much it hurt, she would find a way to make Col stay away from her.

For his sake.

Chapter Twenty-One

Almost as soon as she had settled into bed that night and put out the lantern, Brianna felt the wagon lurch as someone climbed inside. She knew it was Col, yet a part of her froze, terrorized by the thought that it might be her husband. Her arm curved protectively around the small cat beside her while she held her breath and waited.

As though Nigh sensed her fear, he said, “It’s me, Bri.”

She closed her eyes, dreading what she must do. “What are you doing in here? It’s not raining.”

“Rain or not, I’m bunking in here. Ain’t taking no chances on anyone sneaking past me to get to you while I sleep.”

Her eyes adjusted to the dark, allowing her to make out the movement as he pulled his buckskin shirt off over his head and hung it on a nail in one of the wooden hoops. What the shadows hid, she saw clearly in her mind: The dusting of hair that angled down over his flat stomach, the clearly defined muscles of arms and shoulders, the narrow hips and corded legs. He sat down to remove his moccasins, then stood again to take off his leggings. It came to her that she was holding her breath and she forced herself to exhale.

Her most private parts grew hot and tingly. She had to get her mind on something else. Had to find a way to make him leave her alone.

“You agreed to sleep under the wagon in good weather. And stop saying ‘ain’t.’ There is no such word.”

“Huh! Coulda swore I’ve heard it before.” One legging slid to the floor. Her stomach clinched.

“Could have sworn you heard it before—but only by ignorant people.”

“You sayin’ I’m stupid?” The second legging dropped and her bones dissolved.

“No, only ignorant of good English.”

“Can’t read neither. That bother you?”

She bit her lip to keep from telling him how she truly felt. “Of course, it bothers me, I—”

“You could teach me to read. I already learned the alphabet.” He moved the kitten out of the way and sat on the bed facing her, one hand braced on either side of her. Then he bent and kissed her. His voice was low and husky. “You never answered my question earlier tonight. Am I good for kissing?”

Honeyed sensations flowed through her body as he kissed her again. She felt like the brandy she had mixed with sugar and mutton tallow to dose her patients with: smooth, liquid, fiery hot, and potent. His mouth moved to her temple, and worked its way downward. Her limbs refused to obey when she ordered them to push him away. Alarm struck her. What if Barret was outside watching the wagon? She had to make Columbus leave.

“Col, I’m so tired and I can’t sleep when you’re in here. Please go sleep under the wagon.”

Nigh stared at her a long time. He heard the fear in her voice. “Something wrong?”

“Yes, something’s wrong. I want to sleep and to do so, I need to have the wagon to myself.”

He got up but didn’t leave. To her dismay, he lifted her blankets and crawled in beside her.

“Col! What are you doing?”

“Should be obvious.”

He leaned his powerful shoulders against the wagon and drew her close so her head lay on his naked chest. His scent washed over her, threatening to destroy what control she had left. She forced herself to draw back. “Columbus Nigh, you get out of this bed right now.”

“I’m staying where I know no one can get to you without going through me first.”

“All right, then I’ll leave.” She tried to sit up but he yanked her back down.

“The hell you will! What’s the matter with you, woman?”

Seconds later, she found herself lying partly on top of him, held there by arms to strong to fight. His warmth branded her through her muslin gown. His springy chest hairs poked through the thin fabric to tickle her breasts.

Nigh lost all perspective as her nipples hardened against him. He forgot he was there only to protect her. Forgot everything except his burning need for her. Threading his fingers through her thick hair, he drew her face down to his. The touch of his lips to hers affected him like lightning, leaving him scorched and trembling.

After the first moment of struggle, Brianna lost herself to the demands of her body, to the ache and the need she didn’t understand. Here was Columbus holding her the way she’d so desperately wanted all the long awful hours she fought to keep Lilith alive. Here was the man she could not bear to be apart from, whose very life had somehow become more important than her own. The life Barret Wight was threatening to take.

But Barret wasn’t here.

It came to her in a flash; if Barret could have come for her himself, he would have. Something had held him up somewhere behind them, so he had sent Punch to let her know she could not escape. How long she had before Nigh’s presence near her put him in danger, she didn’t know. But surely they had tonight.

One night to enjoy each other. One night in which to steal a life’s worth of memories to survive on—once she was back in St. Louis, and under Barret’s thumb.

Her arms entwined around Col’s neck. “Kiss me. Oh, please, kiss me and never stop.”

Nigh frowned at the desperation in her voice. One moment she was trying to make him leave, and the next, she was demanding kisses. Fear? It hadn’t taken much for him to figure out that her sexual experience with her husband had been more pain than pleasure for her. He wanted to show her sex didn’t need to be that way. Now she was offering him the opportunity to do just that and, although his instincts told him there was more to her sudden reversal, his own needs refused to allow him to examine the matter too closely.

“I’ll kiss you all you want,” he whispered as blood surged through his body to engorge him with a passion more compelling than any he had ever known before. “Anywhere you want,” he added, merging his mouth with hers.

His tongue traced the outline of her lips, then ran along the seam until it parted, letting him dip inside to explore the textures of her teeth, her tongue, every sensitive surface of her mouth. Brianna was powerless beneath the onslaught of his passion. She could do no more than allow, accept, accede. His taste intoxicated her. It inflamed her senses and numbed her brain. She couldn’t think. Didn’t want to think. Only to feel.

Nigh spread kisses over her face. He nibbled her ear lobe, traced the petaled curves with the tip of his tongue and breathed his warm breath inside until she shuddered.

“Should I kiss you here?” he murmured beneath her jaw. “Or here?” He nipped her chin with his teeth and worked his way down the smooth white column of her neck, giving her tiny, sensuous bites until he reached the base which he laved with his tongue.

Brianna moaned and writhed against him. “How do you do that?” she whispered brokenly. “How can you make a bite set fire to my insides that way?”

Col chuckled. “Do I?”

“Yes. It makes me feel wild and . . .
hungry.”

“Where else would you like to be kissed, woman?” He worked a hand between them to cup her breast. “Here? Would you like the feel of my mouth on your breast? Would you like me to suckle you like a babe?”

His words were like flames licking along her nerves. Heat and moisture collected between her legs where a pleasurable ache throbbed. For an instant the image of Barret, grabbing and clawing at her, intruded, and she started to draw away.

Thinking she was making room for him to touch her more freely, Col began to caress her rounded flesh and lightly circle her nipple with his thumb. At once the small nub tightened and thrust forward.

“You feel so good,” he murmured, his lips on hers. “I want to touch every inch of you, with my hands and my mouth. It’s right between us. You know that, don’t you? We belong together.”

The sun and the moon, she thought. Was he right? Did they belong together?

His hand was creating heaven with her breast. In spite of her fear, she found herself unable to move away. Unable, or unwilling, to stop him.

With his free hand Col slipped the ribbon from her thick braid. His fingers worked the strands loose, then fanned the mass out so that it covered them like a blanket of shredded satin. He gloried in the texture and inhaled the scent. Roses. The fragrance mingled with the clean woman smell of her. The slightly musky, sensuous essence of her growing passion was driving him wild.

Rolling them onto their sides, he slid the top button of her nightdress from its hole. Her whimper and the hand that fluttered above his forced him to rise above the volcano of his own raging need and recognize that the tenseness in her body was fear, not desire. Slow down, he told himself. He was pushing her too fast. He slid his hand back down to her breast. Her hand followed and hovered there. Barely cupping her rounded flesh, he held his hand still and concentrated on kissing her, until he felt her relax.

He suckled her lower lip, tickled the sensitive inner surfaces of her mouth with his tongue, then moved to her upper lip, subtly preparing her for the feel of his mouth on her breasts.

Brianna’s hand fell aside and she returned his kiss, gladly allowing herself to get lost in the heat and the pleasure he gave her. When his mouth left hers and began its moist, nibbling voyage down her neck, she did not object. He kissed her collarbone through the muslin of her nightdress and she gasped. His breath warmed her skin. When his lips moved lower, the coolness of the damp fabric against her flesh added to the new flood of sensations he created.

Then she felt his mouth on her breast and froze. The exquisiteness of his touch there was like a flower bursting through the snow after a hard winter, to bask in the rays of the sun. In the heat of the sun. The burning, blazing heat. Her entire body seemed to draw inward on itself, tensed as though waiting for some incredible explosion, a volcanic eruption that would rock her being and change her forever. It frightened and enthralled her at the same time. Surely there could be no greater pleasure.

Then his lips surrounded the pebbled peak of her breast. She sucked in air and steeled herself, knowing something was about to rupture deep inside her, down low in her abdomen near the apex of her legs where the throbbing pitch of need was most extreme. She hung in suspension, while he gently licked her breast, caught her nipple between his teeth and let it slide free between his teeth, then suckled lustily.

“You’re burning me up,” she murmured as she arched against him. “The sun . . . the rays of the sun . . . scalding me.”

“Not yet,” he whispered against her breast. “I can make you hotter, take you higher.”

His hand moved back to the buttons of her gown, working quickly now, deftly, as he slipped one after another free. His lips found the exposed flesh and she realized he had been right. This was even better, bare flesh to bare flesh. She marveled that it could feel so good, so right. She had felt Barret’s mouth on her breasts, Barret’s teeth. It had hurt her, sickened her. But this was Columbus and every touch of his hands, his lips, was heaven.

Nigh gloried in the sound of Brianna’s moan and the way she arched higher as his mouth closed over her naked breast. She tasted like nectar and felt like the finest velvet. He ran his tongue around the rosy circle of her areola and applauded the satiny texture. Her hands were in his hair, holding him tightly to her. The little whimpers coming from her throat tore at his control. He yearned to rip away her gown, wrap her thighs around him and plunge deep inside. The thought of how it would feel to be sheathed in her moist heat brought such pain he knew he would die if he couldn’t have her.

He moved to her other breast and heard the thunder of her heartbeat match his own. He laved and worshipped her with his lips, his tongue while his hand inched down her rib cage to the graceful curve of her waist and hip. He smoothed his palm across her flat stomach, and fanned out to caress her thigh.

When Brianna felt his hand dip between her legs, she stiffened and waited for the pain.

Col’s head lifted, his hand stilled. “You’re so beautiful, so perfect,” he whispered. Then his mouth reclaimed her breast and his kiss was almost reverent in its tenderness. For the first time in her life Brianna felt beautiful. She tried to relax. This was Col. He wouldn’t hurt her.

But she found herself dreading the moment when he rolled her onto her stomach, dreaded the pain, the humiliation. Passion gave way to fear.

Nigh felt her emotional withdraw and cursed wordlessly. Rising onto an elbow he peered down at her. She turned her face away. Cupping her cheek with his hand, he felt the wetness. “What is it? You know I won’t hurt you.”

“I-I know. I just can’t. . . . Barret keeps intruding. I keep waiting for the pain.”

“Blast his infernal hide! I could kill him for what he’s done to you.”

“No!” She looked at him then and put her hand to his face. “Please, I couldn’t bear it if you were hurt.”

His anger melted at the urgency in her voice. She cared for him. Only love could cause such fear. His heart soared. “Shh. I won’t be the one to get hurt. Don’t worry about me, sweet woman. I didn’t know anything could be as good as it is with you. I’m not about to give you up now.”

The words were what she had longed to hear. Yet they struck terror in her heart as she remembered the message Punch Moulton had given her. The words burst from her without warning: “You have to give me up, Col. Barret will kill you if he finds you anywhere near me.”