The Texan's Diamond Bride (10 page)

She wanted her jeans off, wanted his off, wanted his mouth…She wanted it everywhere, right then, no more waiting.

She’d come right then and there, if he kept sucking on her nipple that way. Just that would be enough.

He slid his thigh high against her, stroking her through her jeans, and she arched up against him, holding his head to her breasts.

The man made her insane.

The whole situation was insane, but he was right.

No one would ever have to know.

It was their lives, their bodies, their secret, their time out of time, right here, right now.

Paige had this crazy impulse to tell him she loved him. It flashed through her head in a second, taking her breath away, leaving her weak and scared and thrilled, all at the same time. Did she love him? She had never really felt that way about anyone before.

He moved from one breast to the other, and she made
a purring sound of pure pleasure, pure need. Now he was messing with her mind as much as her body.

She’d be crazy to even think of loving him.

Still, the idea kept nagging at her, running around in her brain, sneaking through the fog of pleasure he’d created there and making her actually think about it.

What if she loved him?

And then when they finished this, and she had to talk him into letting her go find the diamond…he’d think this was all about that damned diamond.

“Dammit,” she muttered.

He lifted his head for an instant, annoyed and breathless and so sexy it hurt. “What?”

“I…I’m sorry, but we can’t do this yet!”

He groaned, closed his eyes, hung his head over her chest, the rest of his body still lying heavily on top of hers.

“We just…we have to settle this thing with the stupid diamond first, Travis. I’m sorry, but we do.”

“We already did,” he complained, but he rolled off of her anyway.

Travis pulled her up on her side with her back against the sofa, and he rolled onto his side, too, facing her. He looked seriously annoyed, seriously aroused.

“You’re going to sleep with me, so I’ll let you look for the diamond, remember? And I’m going to let you seduce me, and then I’ll be so crazy for you, I’ll let you do anything, including look for the diamond. It’s perfect and both our families will understand, because they expect the worst of each other, anyway.”

“I know, but that’s for them, if they ever find out and
start being jerks about it. I’m talking about us. We have to settle this first for us because…because…”

“Because why, Red?” He cupped her face with his hand, still breathing hard but giving her a sweet smile.

“Because I couldn’t stand it if you thought I was going to sleep with you to get that damned diamond,” she said.

He looked completely exasperated. “At the moment, I don’t really care why you do it, just that you do.”

“I know, but come morning, you will care and I’ll care, too. I can’t have you hating me, Travis, or thinking I’m just another scheming woman who wants something from you and will use her body to get it.”

He sighed, then swore. “I don’t think that.”

“Maybe not now, but afterward, when I start talking you into letting me back into the mine, you will. So we have to settle this now, and then…we can do whatever we want.”

He went still, really looking at her. “Promise? The we-can-do-whatever-we-want part? After we settle this?”

“Yes. And my vote for what happens right after we settle this would be getting naked.”

“And you expect me to have a serious conversation with you after hearing that? I hardly have any blood in my brain right now, Red.”

“Come on, focus. We have a goal in mind, Travis. We settle this, we can get naked.”

He shook his head, trying to clear it. “If this is your idea of negotiating, you’re really good at it.”

“This is me, sick of everything standing between us and wanting to fix it, so I can take my clothes off and climb into your bed. Come on. Get up. We can’t do this horizontally, and I think I have an idea.”

H
e sat up, got to his feet, poured himself a shot of whiskey neat and ran a hand through his hair, thinking if she was out to mess with his head, she was succeeding brilliantly.

Maybe he was a fool, but he really didn’t care, because he was going to have her. And maybe then he’d be able to think straight and make some sense of this whole thing.

Maybe.

He sat back down, on the far end of the sofa, and she sat at the other end, turned sideways to face him, one leg tucked up under her, her arm stretched out along the back.

God, he loved that wild, crazy hair of hers.

That was his first thought. Not the greatest start to any negotiations, he knew, but still…That hair was
magnificent. It made him absolutely crazy. He wanted it spread out over his chest after they made love, could imagine her stroking his entire body with her hair.

“I don’t think you’re focusing,” she said.

Travis rolled his eyes, telling himself she wasn’t his ex-wife, and he wasn’t about to get stupid over a woman again. The thing was, she was so much smarter than his ex-wife and more beautiful, and he wanted her even more.

Which had the potential to make him even stupider and her even more dangerous, which was a terrifying thought.

God help him.

“Okay, Red,” he said. “Tell me why I’m going to let you back into that mine. I’m assuming you have some reason other than the fact that you’re gorgeous and sexy, and I want you so bad I can hardly see straight?”

She blinked up at him. “You’re not helping. Focus, remember?”

“Okay, tell me why.”

“Because my brother is as stubborn as you are, and he won’t give up trying to force his way onto the ranch, just because you say no the first time or the first ten times he tries to make it happen. And the whole thing will just turn into one giant hassle that goes on and on, and you’ll hate that, Travis. You’ll absolutely hate it.”

“Yeah, I would, but that’s no reason to give him what he wants,” he argued, hating her brother right now. “And what the hell is wrong with the guy? Sending his little sister in to do a dangerous job like heading into an abandoned mine? I plan on telling him that, too.”

She frowned. “When you have a geologist in the family, someone who actually has experience working
in mines, if you’re smart, that’s who you send to do the job. And you’re not staying focused.”

“Okay. Fine. But I have to say, the idea of frustrating your brother sounds really good to me.”

“Not if that’s not what you really want. Think about yourself here and what you want—”

He grinned. “That’s easy, Red. I want you.”

“Besides me. You want as little hassle as possible with my family, especially over the diamond, which is probably here on this ranch you love. Think about it. No more treasure hunters sneaking onto your ranch, and no McCords taking you to court, if they have to, to get into that mine.”

“Court?”

“Stubborn, Travis. Remember, my brother’s very stubborn, like you. And, as he’s already pointed out, my family owns the mineral rights. We’re talking about a mine. He claims we have the right to go in there and mine anytime we want. He’ll say we’re simply exercising the mineral rights and we can fight in court, if you want, for a long time. But you don’t want that. What do you want?”

“Besides you naked? Right?”

“Yes, besides that. Come on. What do you want? You want to never have a hassle over this stupid diamond again, right?”

He blinked once, then again. Absolutely damned right. “Yes. How do I get that?”

“By settling it right now. You and me. We’ll do it together. All we have to do is trust each other a little.”

He balked at that.

“I know. Not your strong suit. Stay with me here. You
trust me, at least a little bit, right? And I trust you. I want a chance to look for the diamond, and you get a chance to get my brother off your back.”

“Only if you find the damned thing. If not we’ll be looking forever. There are five old silver mines on this ranch.”

“But there’s only one that matters. The Eagle Mine. I…I’m trusting you, Travis. We have the original deeds to the silver mines. There’s a clue on one of the deeds. A tiny clue on the border to the deed to the Eagle Mine. There’s a tiny diamond in one of the eagle’s claws. There’s nothing else like that on any of the other deeds.”

He frowned. “Pretty thin as clues go.”

“Your grandfather Elwin Foley was on that ship when it went down. He was the first owner of this ranch. My grandfather Harry McCord is the first one to have a deeded ownership of that silver mine. If Elwin hid the diamond here, and Harry found it after he won the ranch from Elwin, Harry wouldn’t have left it there without some kind of clue about where he hid it. He must have been hoping that one of his ancestors would find it later and be able to claim it as his own, with no challenge from Elwin Foley.”

Travis was skeptical, but she seemed to believe she knew where that diamond was.

“That mine is full of petroglyphs,” she reminded him. “You know that. You let the archaeologists inside the mines last year. I have their final report, cataloging the drawings and carvings. Eight of the petroglyphs in the Eagle Mine are of eagles. Don’t you see? The diamond is in the Eagle Mine, the spot marked by one of the eagles.”

Damn.

Maybe she would find it.

“And if I don’t find the diamond,” she continued, “this whole thing will be over in a week or two. I’ll go to my brother and tell him the diamond’s not there, and he’ll believe me. And he’ll have no reason to ever bother you with this again. You’ll have all the peace and quiet you want.”

Travis had to admit, that part sounded good.

“I’ll even tell the world we know where Elwin Foley left the diamond, that Harry McCord found it and marked the spot, but it’s not there anymore. That we looked, and that someone must have already found it. I’ll look exhausted and like I’m ready to cry. I’ll trot out all my academic credentials and even show them the clue on the deed. People will believe me, and they’ll all leave you alone again.”

Travis frowned. Either he was still all caught up in getting her into his bed as quickly as possible, or that made sense. He really did just want the whole mess with the diamond to end. Still, it had been so long since he trusted any woman, and he hated feeling like a fool.

“Travis, this is like the whole thing with the ranch. You don’t really care about the diamond. You just don’t want my family to have it. And my family doesn’t really care about the ranch anymore. They’re just too stubborn to want you to own it. Do the right thing here. Do the thing that causes you the least amount of hassles and forget about the rest.”

“Forget that your family is getting what it wants,” he reminded her.

“Just remember that you’re getting what you want. Oh, hell, you think we’re all crazy to believe the diamond’s even there. I can tell. So if you’re convinced we’re not going to find anything anyway, then this is just sheer stubbornness on your part, to not want to let any of the McCords look for it.”

“Well,” he conceded, “the Foleys have been accused of being stubborn before.”

“Yeah, I’ve heard that. Come on. You know everything I just said makes sense.”

Damn, it did.

He was almost certain it did.

“I know what you really want is the ranch,” she said, “but my brother doesn’t own it. I can’t get you the ranch from him, but when this is over, I’ll talk to my mother. I’ll do everything I can—”

“Red—”

“I know. You don’t think it will ever happen.”

“No,” he admitted. “I don’t. I accepted that a long time ago.”

But he made her want to believe it was possible.

“I’m going to do everything I can,” she said.

Like she thought she could do anything in the world.

He shook his head, thinking she was still a McCord, and he was half-blind with wanting her, no doubt not thinking clearly.

“And then, there’s the fact that I’d have to stay here until it stops raining,” she said, giving him a purely wicked smile. “And it’s flooded everywhere. I’d have to wait until the water went down, so I could get to the mine, right? Night after night?”

“Okay, now you’re just messing with my head,” he said, thinking about nothing but her naked again.

She grinned that super sexy grin of hers. “And…we don’t know, but the mine might be flooded underground, too. I’d have to wait for the water to go down there, and then I’d have to have time to search….”

“And you’d spend every night of that time in my bed,” he said, not asking her, telling her. “How is this different, exactly, than you sleeping with me to get to the diamond?”

“If I was going to do that, I wouldn’t have made you stop a minute ago. This is the two of us having a rational discussion about an issue between us and coming to a rational solution to that problem. So we can put it aside and think now of nothing but ourselves and what we want.”

Okay.
He supposed he got the distinction.

He still felt fuzzy-headed from wanting her so badly, but he thought she’d made sense in all her arguments.

He just had one reservation. “It’s not just stubbornness on my part to want to keep you out of that mine. I worry about you, Red. I can’t stand the idea of you getting hurt down there or God forbid, trapped in there. I’d never forgive myself.”

“We’ll do it together. We’ll be careful. I promise. I know how to do this, Travis, and I’ll have you with me. I couldn’t let anything happen to you, either.” She grinned. “So, we’ve agreed?”

He nodded. “Yes. Now take your clothes off, Red.”

“Here?” she whispered tentatively.

He was halfway out of his shirt and kicking off his boots at the same time. When he actually got the shirt
over his head and tossed it aside, boots off, he looked over at her, standing hesitantly by the sofa.

“Yes, here,” he grinned. “Is that a problem for you?”

The fire was going, and they hadn’t turned on the lights as darkness had fallen outside, so the room wasn’t brightly lit by any means. And there was a nice, soft rug in front of the fire.

She looked incredible by firelight.

He already knew that from their time in the cabin.

“Anybody could just walk right in here,” she protested.

“Has anybody done that in the evenings since you’ve been here?”

“No,” she admitted. “But—”

“Are you nervous, Red?”

“A little.”

“Shy?” he tried, wondering if she could possibly be that. He’d had her nearly naked on the ground the first night they’d met, after all.

And what a night that had been.

He’d made her crazy. He’d made sure of it. Absolutely crazy, more than once, enjoying the way she responded so openly, with such honesty and abandon. Wanting her so crazy for him that the minute they got anywhere with a condom, he could be inside of her, no questions asked, no hesitation, no nothing.

And it hadn’t quite happened like that, but he’d been carrying a condom in his pocket ever since they got to the cabin, like some damned teenager thinking he might get lucky any minute. Someone had been using the cabin as a love nest. He’d found the condom stash there.

“I’m not…” she began. “Just…I didn’t think….”

He took her by the hand, led her to stand in front of him as he sat and told her, “Don’t worry. I’ll take care of everything.”

He started at the bottom button of her blouse, pulling it open, putting his mouth to that spot on her belly near her belly button, his arms wrapping around her, hands cupping her bottom, pulling her to him.

She whimpered, grabbed his shoulders, had her hands in his hair.

“There you go,” he muttered against her soft, trembling skin. “It’s gonna be just fine. Did you like what I did to you that first night at the mine, Red?”

“Yes,” she whispered.

“So we both know that I already know what you like, right?”

“Yes.”

“You’ll like this even better. Trust me.”

She did. She trusted him.

And then his tongue slid around the opening of her belly button and then ever so softly inside.

Her muscles went slack, legs just gone, and it was only his arms holding her tight and the way she draped herself over him that held her up.

That wicked tongue of his…

It felt for all the world like he was inside her, really inside her. Heat blossomed in her pelvis, blood thrumming through her veins, until he dragged her back onto the sofa with him, facing him, straddling him, laughing.

He held her with one hand, undid buttons up her blouse with the other, that wicked mouth following,
like he might lick every inch of her with a hot, sensual slowness and make her insane.

He got to her bra, which happened to close in front and flipped it open, nosed the cups aside again, there was that mouth, those little licks of wet heat, under her breast, around it, that ultrasensitive outer curve and then finally he took her nipple in his mouth and sucked hard.

She arched against him, felt him, hard and ready, against her through their clothes. She didn’t care anymore that they were in his living room, that anyone could walk in or that it wasn’t quite dark in the room.

He went from one breast to the other, and one hand went to the snap of her jeans, the zipper, and then to his own. A moment later, he palmed her hips and stood up, taking her with him. Then he put her on her feet, just long enough for him to strip her of her jeans and panties, then strip off his own, as well.

She didn’t think she’d ever felt so naked in her entire life as she did when he sat back down and just gazed at her standing there in front of him, a look in his eyes that dared her to object or to try to cover herself. Her breasts ached with fullness. Her nipples were so tight, and she was absolutely throbbing with desire.

“Red, you’re beautiful,” he said in that slow, sexy, cowboy drawl of his.

Then he reached out and teased at the patch of red curls between her legs.

“Travis, you can’t do that,” she objected.

“Do what?” he said, watching as she reacted to his touch.

“Leave me standing here like this.”

“But I can see you like this, all of you, and I already told you, you’re so beautiful. I love looking at you like this,” he said, as his wicked fingers slipped inside those curls.