He wanted to put his hands on her hips and thrust into her, burying himself completely in her tight satin heat, ending the exquisite torment. All that prevented him was the intense pleasure that transformed her face each time she moved over him. Eyes closed, generous mouth taut, she came to him with the same abandoned grace he had seen when she’d arched herself to the sky and let water pour from her cupped hands.
“I want all of you,” she whispered against his lips, straining to be as close to him as a woman could be to a man. “Help me, Rio. Help us.”
He looked at her flushed face and saw no fear, no hesitation. The simple truth of her words broke over him, shaking him. He felt her softness straining against the last barrier between them.
“Gently,” he murmured. “Gently, my dreamer.”
His fingers caught her hard nipples, caressing her, sending exquisite lightning through her. He let the storm build, piling caress upon caress until he felt pleasure burst inside her. At that instant he thrust once, deeply, sweeping away the barrier between them. Then he retreated again, fearful of hurting her any more.
Hope followed his retreat, sliding over him, sheathing him deeply in her body. They both cried out in fierce pleasure, wanting it to last forever, to live and die feeling only the unbearably sweet instant when she first measured his full power.
He was no longer the wind. He was as hard and as hot and as hungry for rain as the desert itself. He could feel the storm coming now, feel it sweeping out from him, feel himself on the brink of—
His hands clamped over her hips, holding her absolutely still.
“Don’t move,” he said hoarsely, fighting for control of the storm they had created. “It’s too soon. You aren’t ready.”
Slowly she opened her eyes and looked down at the man she loved. Every muscle in his body was rigid, hot, gleaming with sweat. He filled her mind, her heart, her body, and she wanted nothing more than to bring him a pleasure as wild and as true as her love for him.
He could hold her hips prisoner, but there was nothing he could do about the deep, involuntary movements of her body as she looked down at him with love in her eyes.
He groaned. “Don’t—”
And then he could say no more. Hope was all around him, tugging sleekly at him, and he gave himself to her as though she was the wind calling his name.
She closed her eyes, savoring Rio’s release, feeling the most intense pleasure of her life as the man she loved pulsed within her. She kissed his hot skin, breathed in his unique male scent, tasted the salt of passion. Smiling dreamily, she lay on his chest, content to listen to his heart beating wildly beneath her cheek.
When Rio could breathe again his hands slowly traveled from Hope’s tangled hair down her spine to the warm curve of her hips, and from there to the secret cleft between. His fingertips brushed over sultry flesh, making her breath catch.
The sensitivity of her own body surprised her. She lifted her head and looked into his midnight-blue eyes. He moved against her, within her, smiling up at her with male intent.
“Rio?” she asked, not understanding. She had felt his climax. She was certain that he was satisfied.
“Did you think I would leave you hungry?”
Hope could only shake her head. “You haven’t,” she said simply, still not understanding. “I’ve never felt more pleasure than I did with you just now.”
As Hope’s words sank in, a hot shudder of desire stitched down the length of Rio’s body. She had never had more pleasure—and he hadn’t even begun to make love to her. The thought tore at him with the honeyed claws of ecstasy barely restrained.
“I’ve never lost control with a woman before,” he said in a gritty, rueful voice, “and damned if you aren’t taking me right up to the edge all over again.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You will,” he promised.
Without separating their bodies, he rolled her over onto her back and fitted his mouth to hers.
And then he loved her.
It was like being caught in a hot, gentle whirlwind. Hope felt his tongue thrusting sensually into her mouth even as his hands found the satin weight of her breasts. He caught her nipples between his fingers and tugged. Lightning streaked through her. She moaned and her body moved reflexively, tightening around him.
He laughed with sheer male pleasure.
The sound was another stroke of lightning taking her body by storm. She twisted up against him, needing the feel of his flesh buried inside her. He laughed again before he bent his head and drank the sounds that rippled from her. His fingertips closed on her hard nipples and tugged while hot waves of pleasure washed through her to him, a sensual yielding that was also a feminine demand.
He shifted one hand to the lush curve of her bottom, flexing his fingers against her resilient hip. His words were a dark wind surrounding her, telling her what she felt like, tasted like, what he wanted from her, what he would give to her in return; and through it all his hands stroked and tugged and burned over her, teaching her more than she had ever dreamed about sensual hunger and response.
“Rio,” she said breathlessly, “I—”
The word became a cry as his hand slid between their joined bodies, finding and caressing the slick, pouting knot. He felt her sudden tension, her breath stopping within her, her nails digging into his back. He laughed softly, hotly, confidently, like his fingers stroking her, taking her to the edge and then holding her there poised and shivering on the brink of release.
She made a ragged sound that was his name and a question, surprise and something close to fear. She felt her own body being seduced from her control, a storm at the instant of breaking, her nerves a violent network of lightning straining to be free. Instinctively she held back, uncertain.
“Dreamer,” he said huskily, caressing Hope, “come to me.”
She cried aloud and she gave herself to the storm, to Rio, holding nothing back, knowing ecstasy for the first time in her life. It swept through her like a long, wild wind, shaking her to her soul.
She held on to him, crying, and he held her, kissing away the sweet rain of tears. Blindly she clung to him while her lips caressed his neck, his chest, the hard nub of his nipple. She was drowning in ecstasy, in him, and she whispered her love with each breath she took.
He heard her words, felt the tiny wild movements of her body, and control began slipping away from him again. He fought the whirlwind of desire spiraling up from their joined bodies, making him fill her until each of her breaths was a separate caress over him. He wanted to hold himself back, to protest that he wasn’t like this, that no woman had ever aroused him until he wanted to scream with it, but even that primitive release was denied because his throat was as tight around his words as she was around him.
“I wondered on the stairway if I could get enough of you,” he said finally, his voice low and gritty, as intimate as his movements deep within her body. He bit her shoulder with fierce restraint. “I don’t think I can. Have you had enough of me?”
Her only answer was a sharp cry as anticipation coiled impossibly, hotly, within her again. Lightning strokes of new pleasure ripped through her before the aftershocks of her first ecstasy had fully stilled. She tried to say his name but couldn’t. She could only feel his presence inside her.
He filled her, all of her, leaving room for nothing except the hot silver rains sweeping over her once again. This time she didn’t hesitate in surprise or fear. She knew that he was waiting for her within that torrential passion. And then she was with him, holding him hard and close while ecstasy broke around them, consuming them.
It was a long time before the sensual storm passed, leaving them spent, gleaming with moisture, their bodies tightly intertwined.
Rio kissed and caressed Hope gently, cherishing her. He had never known such wild, intense pleasure with a woman. He hadn’t even believed it was possible. She was like a new land opening before him, a new wind calling his name.
“Hope,”
he whispered.
He wanted to say more, but was able only to say her name again and again. His mouth opened on her lips, asking for a greater intimacy. When she answered with a gliding pressure of her tongue, he caught it almost hungrily.
Rio didn’t understand his need, for it wasn’t sexual hunger driving him. He felt like a man racing to catch the wind, to hold it, to absorb it so completely into himself that he would never be separate again.
So he held her, surrounding her, letting her drift asleep within the cradle of his arms.
He didn’t sleep. He couldn’t. He lay and watched moonlight bathe Hope in unearthly silver beauty. And when he could control himself no longer, he began touching her with his hands and his lips and his tongue.
She woke slowly, languidly, murmuring Rio’s name and her love while his mouth caressed her lips, her neck, her breasts, her body, moving over her like his brother the wind, learning each of her soft secrets. Long before he came to her she was crying and twisting against his unbearably knowing mouth, lost in the ecstasy shaking her.
Even then he didn’t take her. He simply, hungrily, began all over again, memorizing her, leaving none of her hot skin untasted, knowing all of her, cherishing her with a primal sensuality that shattered her.
That was when he took her, when his name was a wild cry on her lips.
It was her name, too, his broken cry against her mouth, their voices intertwined as deeply as their moonlit bodies.
Nineteen
THE NEXT DAY Hope awoke to the fragrance of rain flowers drifting softly over her skin. She opened her eyes and saw bright yellow blossoms falling from Rio’s hand.
His smile was as warm as the sunrise flooding the room with shades of gold and rose. Kissing her lips gently, he pulled the covers back up to her neck, concealing the womanly allure of her body. His hands curved around the blanket and her breasts.
“Last night taught me that I have no willpower where you’re concerned, so I’m going to put all your temptations out of my sight.”
“Why?” she asked sleepily, winding her arms around his neck. “If you give in, I won’t be nearly so tempting to you afterward, will I?”
Laughing almost roughly, he disentangled her arms, kissing every inch of them along the way. He bit her palms and touched the sensitive skin between her fingers with the tip of his tongue.
“The more I have you,” he said, closing his teeth over each of her fingertips in turn, “the more I want you. If I give in, the only explorations that get done on the ranch today will be done in this bed.”
Hope’s hazel eyes kindled. “What a lovely thought,” she murmured, curling her fingers around his, tugging him down toward her.
“Does that mean you don’t want to go riding with me?”
Amusement curved her lips.
“Let me rephrase that,” he said quickly. “I’ve got a very interesting prospect for a well site. Do you want to go over it with me?”
Her sleepy, sensual humor evaporated. “Do you mean that? Have you really found a place to drill for water?”
“I don’t know. So far things look good. I was going to check it out yesterday, but I went into town instead.” He watched her with searching, intense eyes, wondering how she felt toward him in the clear light of another day.
Hope’s smile faded as she remembered why Rio had left yesterday. He hadn’t wanted to be her lover.
And now he was.
“Hope,” he began, seeing shadows in her eyes.
“No,” she cut in, her fingers over his lips. “I know you didn’t want to be my lover. But it happened. I don’t expect you to change. Don’t expect me to change, either. I love you, Rio. Nothing will change that.”
He gave her a swift, fierce kiss, then left the room like it was on fire. He didn’t trust himself to touch her anymore without sweeping away the blankets and knowing again the searing ecstasy of her body joined with his, her cries rippling through all of his silences.
Yesterday she had been a virgin. Today she was his woman. Tomorrow . . .
Tomorrow belonged to the wind. He would face it when he had to. Until then, today beckoned, radiant with Hope.
“Your bath is two feet deep and steaming,” Rio called as he went down the stairs. “By the time you’re dressed, I’ll have breakfast ready.”
“Where are we going?” Hope asked as she got out of bed. She shivered when her warm bare feet hit the cold bare floor.
“Ain’t telling,” he drawled.
She laughed at his laconic imitation of Mason. Then she raced for the hot welcome of a bath. She lingered, soaking out every small ache of the body she and Rio had so thoroughly enjoyed.
Finally she couldn’t resist the smell of breakfast. Without looking, she stood and reached for a towel. The rack was empty. The nearest towel supply was in the linen closet down the hall. The cold hall.
Just as she nerved herself up for a chilly dash to the linen closet, the bathroom door opened. Rio’s hand appeared. A thick, soft towel dangled from his fist.
“Missing something?” he asked.
“Brrr,” she answered.
He came in and closed the door behind him so that the steamy warmth couldn’t escape. Then he held the towel wide in silent invitation. She stepped into it, and his arms. He kissed her until it was impossible to know whether her flushed skin came from the hot bath or from the even hotter passion he called from her.
“That’s what I was missing,” he said huskily. Then he lifted his head and put her away from his hungry, insistent body. “If I don’t stop right now, neither one of us is going to be in any shape to get on a horse.”
“Especially if the horse is Storm Walker,” she said, smiling at him with trembling lips.
“I think I’ll leave that tough old son in the corral today,” Rio admitted. “I suspect he has more hard in him this morning than I do.”
When Hope looked down Rio’s body, she saw the unmistakable bulge pushing against his jeans. A shiver of pleasure coursed through her when she remembered the beauty of his body beneath her hands. In the wake of memory came the rushing, liquid heat that had become familiar last night. Slowly, murmuring approval, she moved her hand over the length of his arousal.
His breath broke. “I thought you would be sore.”
She shook her head.
His hand slid up between her legs. The hungry, molten silk that waited for him was a revelation. His breath broke as his heartbeat doubled.
“You sure?” he asked, stroking her, watching for any sign that she was flinching away.
She shifted, opening to his touch. The hot pulse of her response on his fingers said that she was ready for him.
“I want you to be able to ride,” he said.
Yet even as he spoke, he caressed her, drawing more of her liquid silk to him.
Her eyelids trembled down as an exquisite thrill of pleasure rippled through her. “I’ll tie a pillow to the saddle.”
He laughed and sank to his knees. “That won’t be necessary.”
The sultry, wild whirlwind of his mouth closed over her. When she was trembling and crying, he pulled her down and let the storm take them both. By the time it was spent, he lay fully clothed on the cold floor with her over him like a blanket. Smiling, he stroked her back.
“I must be crushing you,” Hope said.
He laughed, and in laughing moved inside her.
“Mmm,” she purred. “That feels good.”
His heartbeat quickened again. “Better get up, dreamer. We have a well to find.”
She kissed his jaw, sighed, and struggled into a sitting position astride him.
His breath caught. “Hope?”
“Mmm?”
He lifted her off his quickening flesh. “Get out of here or neither one of us will be able to walk, much less ride.”
She looked at Rio, saw that he was still hard, and said, “Why don’t I just drag you fully dressed into that tub? It’s still hot.”
For an instant Hope thoug
ht he was going to let her—and so did he.
With a wrench that was almost painful, he stood and tucked himself back into his jeans. He started to say something, shook his head ruefully, and got out of the steamy intimacy of the bathroom.
“Breakfast is ready,” he said from the safety of the hallway. And so am I.
Again.
His response to Hope kept taking Rio by surprise, like finding an artesian spring in the middle of a vast desert waste. The spring shouldn’t be there. All logic and experience were against it. But there it was just the same, pure and sweet and inexhaustible, pulsing with rhythms that were deeper than logic and experience, as deep as life itself.
By the time Hope dressed and walked into the kitchen, Rio had filled two plates with mounds of hotcakes, ham, and eggs. She measured the huge breakfast and looked at him in silent protest.
“You’ll be glad for every bite by lunchtime,” he said.
She ate without arguing. She knew he was right. Besides, she was unusually hungry. When she tucked the last morsel of hotcake neatly into her mouth and looked up from her plate, he was smiling at her.
Rio touched the fullness of her lower lip, licked his fingertip, and said, “Sweet.”
“Syrup always is,” she pointed out reasonably, smiling at him with love in her eyes.
He shook his head slowly. “Not syrup. You.” He sighed and pushed his chair back from the table. “Let’s go before my good intentions hitch a ride on the wind. Again.”
“You never told me where we were going.”
“You distracted me.”
“Good for me. Was it good for you?”
He laughed. “You know it was. Wind Canyon.”
Smiling, Rio poured the rest of the coffee into a canteen, tossed a paper bag full of sandwiches to Hope, put his arm around her shoulders, and walked out into the sun-filled morning. Leaning lightly against him, she slid her arm around his waist. Her long legs kept pace with clean, graceful movements.
“I’m not a bit sore,” she said, grinning. “Must be all those years of riding.”
He gave a crack of laughter, kissed her swiftly on the lips, and lifted her over the pasture fence. He watched while she caught Aces, swung up bareback on the mare, and rode to the fence. The elegance of Hope’s legs was clear even when they were covered by worn jeans and scuffed cowboy boots. He kept remembering how it felt when those long legs had wrapped around him, holding him tightly within her silky heat.
Beautiful Dreamer with Bonus Material Page 19