“I don’t have anything with me, Dulcy.”
She blinked at him. “I don’t care.”
He swallowed hard. “I do. I…want to protect you.”
“I haven’t been intimate with anyone but you for three years,” she rasped, her hands sliding down his back and into the waist of his jeans.
Quinn stretched his neck and closed his eyes. Dear Lord, help him. “I’ve never had unprotected sex.”
“Then that means we don’t have anything to worry about, doesn’t it?” The tip of her tongue flicked against one corner of his mouth, then the other. “I want to feel you, Quinn. All of you. Flesh in flesh.”
He caught and held her gaze, Ewtoto’s trot slowing even further as though he sensed what was going on on his back. “And the risk of pregnancy?”
Her smile challenged the brightness of the setting sun and won. “What of it?”
On a normal day, words like that would have sent him running full speed in the other direction. Hadn’t it been an unexpected pregnancy that caught his mother up short at seventeen?
A groan caught in his throat as she circled her fingers around to the front of his waistband, then slowly undid the remainder of the buttons there. The feel of the hot desert air against the sensitive skin of his erection sent jolts of heat spiraling through his bloodstream. As soon as he was completely free, he grasped her bottom and hauled her up on top of him, his gaze glued to hers, searching, waiting for any sign that she’d changed her mind. Then, for the first time in his life, he felt the pure, slick heat of a woman surrounding him. Of Dulcy taking him inside her. No thin layer of latex separating them.
He closed his eyes against the headiness of the moment. The weightiness. She was heaven.
Her shiver told of her own exciting reaction. As she balanced herself, he unbuttoned her blouse and pushed it back on her shoulders, gazing down on the soft crests of flesh spilling out of her bra. He swept his palms down over the front, then cupped her breasts in his hands.
She slid down to the hilt, and Quinn grasped her hips, held her aloft, then thrust upward, breathing in her sharp gasp.
Ewtoto made a soft neigh, but Quinn was too far gone to consider the stallion. In and out, he moved inside Dulcy’s sweet flesh, thrusting in time to Ewtoto’s steps. Dulcy wound her arms around his neck as if holding on for dear life. Then he felt her crisis hit. Her stomach shuddered, her flesh tightened around him, and an instant later he followed.
HOT…hard…full. That’s how Quinn felt deep inside her. He filled her unlike any man before him. Physically. Spiritually. Needfully.
Dulcy fought to catch her breath, her fingers digging into his sweat-coated back, her tongue dipping out to taste the salty residue covering his right shoulder. Somewhere over the past few minutes, she’d forgotten about her fear of falling from the horse and lost herself in the moment. Lost herself in Quinn’s embrace. His kiss. His lovemaking.
She closed her eyes and rested her cheek against his shoulder. When she blinked, she caught the view of the sun sliding down over the horizon, vivid steaks of red, purple and blue painting the sky.
Quinn shifted her slightly but didn’t pull out. She steadied herself and drew back to look at him. It was there, staring deep into his dark eyes, his flesh still deeply imbedded in hers, evidence of his desire trickling down her thighs, that she felt she might burst from the emotion filling her.
“I love you.” Dulcy’s throat tightened. Thinking the words was one thing, enough to scare her half to death. Having said them aloud…
“Dulcy, I…” Quinn grasped her hips, as if caught between wanting to continue their lovemaking and ending it.
“Shh,” she said, pressing her sensitive fingertip against his lips. Even the horse seemed to sense the gravity of the conversation as he drew to a stop beneath them. “I don’t want you to respond. I didn’t even mean to say it.” She swallowed hard. “I didn’t even realize until this moment that that’s how I felt.” She tucked her chin into her exposed chest. “I know this is such a mess. Everything. Brad. Me. You.” She shook her head. “This is the worst possible time for this to happen.” She blinked up at him. “But nothing will change that it has happened.”
Quinn didn’t say anything. The sun had totally set, casting his face in shadow. “Dulcy, Brad is my best friend.”
“I know,” she whispered.
What more was there to say?
Making up his mind for him, she pulled back, forcing his withdrawal. He let her. Which made the tiny ache in her chest blow up into a full-octane pain. She drew in a ragged breath. “This is all so crazy.”
She moved to get off the horse. Quinn caught her forearm just before she fell and helped ease her down. In that moment she realized she trusted him more than anyone. Could she ever have said that about Brad? Even in the beginning when she’d been told he was gone, a part of her suspected his vanishing had been voluntary. In five months they hadn’t come near to making the connection that she and Quinn had forged in mere days.
But in the end did any of that matter? Quinn was a man true to his word and true to his family and friends. And his and Brad’s friendship transcended any woman. Especially if that woman was her.
The ground beneath her bare feet was hot, while the air around her seemed suddenly cold. She shivered and rubbed her hands against her bare arms, then began rebuttoning her blouse. Quinn climbed down to stand next to her, helping when her trembling fingers appeared incapable of the simple task.
He tapped her under the chin until she was looking up at him. Once again she was struck by how very tall he was. How magnificent.
“There will be time to figure this all out later, Dulcy.”
She rested her palm against his chest. “Will there?” Cotton met her touch instead of bare, hot skin. He’d put his T-shirt on after she’d slid to the ground.
“And what if we don’t find Brad?” she whispered, tears stinging her eyes. She forced her gaze away and looked toward the horizon. “What happens then, Quinn? Do I continue on as if I’m still engaged to a man if I don’t know whether he’s dead or alive? Do you stay true to a friend?”
He tucked her hair behind her ear. “I don’t know.”
She turned in the direction she thought was the way back to the ranch house. “I do. We both live in limbo, waiting for what tomorrow will bring. Wishing for it all to be over. Forever calling into question each other’s loyalty. To your friend. To my fiancé.” She glanced briefly at him. “To each other.” She shivered again. “I don’t know if you believe me, Quinn. There’s really no reason for you to believe me. But I’ve never done anything like this in my life. Given my word to one man, then slept with another. Much less his best friend.”
She turned quickly to walk away.
Quinn caught her hand, stopping her. She didn’t face him. He didn’t force her to. His voice, when he spoke, was deep and full of emotion. “Have I ever given you reason to believe I think less of you because of your connection to Brad? Because of what’s happened between us?”
Dulcy could barely make him out through the tears in her eyes.
“If I’m hesitant, it has nothing to do with you, Dulcy. Not one damn thing.”
“Wait—”
“No. You need to hear this.” He took a deep breath and released it. “Actually, I’m wrong. My hesitancy is completely due to you. Not because I think less of you. But because I think so much.” His voice lowered. “Don’t you see? I have had women in my life who have tried to make me do things I don’t want to do. Asked me to turn my back on my family. To give up everything I love about ranching and move to the city.” He shook his head. “But you…you ask for nothing. Not one single thing. You tell me you love me, but you don’t want me to respond. You give yourself to me freely, with no conditions, with no thought to the emotional cost.” He skimmed a finger over her cheek. “And it all makes me want to give you everything.”
Dulcy made a soft choking sound. It was the sweetest thing anyone had ever said
to her. And that it had come from Quinn made it all the sweeter. All the more meaningful.
“Did I want all this to happen? Did you? No. But it doesn’t change that it has happened.” He paused, curving his hand around the side of her neck. “Brad…Brad was the first friend I ever knew. I owe him a lot, my life. But my heart…my heart is mine. Mine to decide what to do with.” He smiled. “Well, at least it was until one very wild, sexy attorney stole it right out from under my nose.”
Dulcy lunged into his embrace, listening to the quick thud of his heart beneath her ear, helpless to stop the tears from gliding down her cheeks.
“Come on,” Quinn said after a long while, his hands softly stroking her back. “There’s a house on the ranch not too far from here. There’s water there where we can clean up.” He gestured to the horse, still standing where they’d left him. “And Ewtoto would probably appreciate a rest and a drink.”
The stallion neighed, and Dulcy smiled and wiped the tears from her cheeks.
Quinn held out his hand and Dulcy slid hers in it, as if they were made to fit together.
13
QUINN FORCED HIMSELF not to hold on too tightly to Dulcy’s hand as they walked the short way to the tiny pueblo where his mother had managed to raise him. They’d survived on the limited income she’d received as a housekeeper for a cattle ranch three miles up the road—on a tract of land he’d since bought. As he led Dulcy to his childhood home, he tried to define what he was feeling and came up short. Raw. Exposed. Warm. Trusted. Trustworthy. Each swirled around in his head and chest, and grew more complicated with each step.
Dulcy loved him….
She squeezed his hand, and he realized he was squeezing hers. He lifted it to his lips and kissed the back, then dropped their joined hands back to his side.
By the light of a luminous quarter moon he led the way to the house, although he could have found the place in the dark. He’d done it enough times when he was a kid after a long day spent working on his uncle’s—now his—ranch. The adobe house was little more than a fifteen-by-ten room with three windows—two in the front on either side of the door, one in the back—both the east and west walls solid, cutting down on direct sunlight to combat the desert heat. He’d kept it exactly the way it had been the day he’d come home from his first real job off the ranch and told his mother to come with him to Albuquerque, taking little more with them than the personal mementos and their clothes.
The only person he’d ever brought out here was Brad. And that was only once, back when they were younger and he hadn’t had a choice. Brad had just gotten his first car and insisted on driving him all the way home instead of leaving him off at the road near the ranch, more than likely because he’d wanted his friend’s company for a little longer rather than because of any real curiosity about Quinn’s upbringing.
Quinn remembered the queasy feeling in the pit of his stomach as he wondered what Brad would think, if the new information would affect their friendship, change it. Strangely, he didn’t feel that way now with Dulcy. It was as though he knew instinctively that he could trust her with the truth about his background. That she wouldn’t use it against him, make him feel inferior.
A small well powered by an old windmill was about thirty feet behind the house. He led Ewtoto there and pumped him a good portion of water. He removed his saddle and blankets, then splashed a bit of water over the horse’s back and hindquarters, then washed his own face. He stepped aside and watched as Dulcy did the same.
“This is where you were raised?” she asked quietly.
Quinn smiled at her. “Ezzie must like you.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Because the only person who could have told you that is Ezzie. And she never talks to anyone.” He took her hand again, finding her skin cool from the water. “Come on.”
Within moments they were standing before the front door. Quinn found it remarkable that every time he visited, the place seemed to grow smaller and smaller. Or perhaps it was he who had grown bigger.
It had been some time since he’d been out there. He felt for the key hidden in the loose adobe on the left side of the door opposite the lock. It wasn’t there. He frowned and wrapped his fingers around the knob. It turned easily.
Strange…
And he found out just how strange things could get when he opened the door and in the dim light from the moon saw two figures scramble from the bed in the middle of the room.
“What in the hell?” a man called out.
Dulcy gasped and grabbed Quinn’s arm. “Brad!”
DULCY DIDN’T KNOW whether to scream or bolt, so she decided doing neither would be a good bet. Her heart thundered against her rib cage. Her fingernails were deeply imbedded in the flesh of Quinn’s arm.
She supposed the surprise of finding anyone at all in the tiny house would have been enough to startle her. But to see Brad there, with another woman no less, was enough to send her stomach pitching to her feet.
Fast on the heels of surprise came another emotion. Relief. Full, profound, muscle-robbing relief. He wasn’t lying dead in a ditch somewhere, the victim of a car-jacking gone wrong. He wasn’t tied up in a dank, dark basement undergoing torture while his kidnappers decided what to do next. No. He was okay.
The words wove through her mind a second time. He was okay.
She gasped as Quinn did what she suddenly itched to. He hauled off and hit Brad right in the jaw.
“Ow!” Brad toppled back onto the mattress, the sheet he held in front of him nearly falling away. “What the hell did you go and do that for?”
Quinn looked as if he wanted to do much more than hit Brad. His body seemed to vibrate with a suppressed energy that made her shiver, and Dulcy wrapped her arms around herself. Someone lit a gas lantern, and she realized that someone was a woman. A very naked, very attractive Hispanic woman who didn’t seem to care that she was completely nude.
Quinn threw her a blanket draped over a nearby chair. “Cover yourself, Yolanda.”
Yolanda? Dulcy’s heart skipped a beat. This was Yolanda?
Dulcy openly stared at the only other woman Quinn had brought out to his ranch, trusted with his heart. Thick black hair hung to the middle of her back. Dark eyes glittered dangerously. A full, red mouth was pursed in anger. She looked at Brad, cooing something to him, then pointed at Quinn. “I told you he was a very angry, very jealous man.”
Quinn made a sound.
Dulcy felt her ire rise. “Quinn didn’t hit Brad because he’s jealous, you moron. He hit him because we’ve all been worried sick about him for the past two days.”
A shadow of amusement lit Quinn’s eyes as he looked at her.
“Moron? Why you—”
The other woman flung herself in Dulcy’s direction. Dulcy squared her feet, but impact never occurred. Brad had caught her by the waist and pulled her back. “There will be none of that, Yolanda.”
Quinn crossed his arms over his chest. “Dulcy and I are returning to the ranch. That’s where I want to see you,” he pointed to Brad, “in no more than a half hour.”
Brad sank back to the mattress and ran his hands through his tousled blond hair. Dulcy found it hard to believe that the man before her was the same one she’d known. Where was the guy who had wanted to wait for their wedding night because he respected her? Her gaze shifted to Yolanda, then back to him again. More than likely he hadn’t slept with her because he was too tired to do anything but sleep, period, when the Mexican bombshell was done with him.
She swallowed hard, barely aware when Quinn grasped her arm and tugged her toward the door.
IT HAD TAKEN BRAD an hour and a half to make his way to the ranch and he’d had Yolanda, thankfully fully dressed, in tow. But Quinn refused to have a discussion that was long overdue right then. No. He had told Brad he’d contacted his mother, Beatrix, and that they would wait until she got there before proceeding with any explanations. Dulcy had been grateful for the temporary reprieve. She hoped the ti
me would give her a chance to work through the shock of it all. But here it was three hours later and she was still shaking.
She sat in the bathroom, where she’d been for at least the past hour, door tightly closed and locked, gripping the closed commode for all she was worth. She hadn’t been able to sit in the living room a moment longer, watching Quinn stand in the corner like a dark sentinel and Brad and Yolanda share the couch across from her.
My God, had everything really come down to this? Her and Quinn? Brad and Yolanda? Three days and how many man-hours spent looking for Brad while he was off schtuping Quinn’s ex-girlfriend mere days before their wedding? Dulcy smoothed her hair back, trying to find a way to return to some sense of normalcy, to get a grip on all that was going on and figure out a way to work herself into the picture. Or, more preferably, out of it.
This was just all so…bizarre.
Surprisingly, even after all she and Quinn had done together over the past few days, she felt betrayed by Brad’s behavior. But above and beyond everything else, she knew a relief so complete her legs barely supported her. A relief that Brad was all right, yes. But also a relief that she wouldn’t have to marry him now. And she wouldn’t have to be the bad guy in the breakup, either.
She knew it was selfish, but she felt better knowing that both of them had been equally bad, even if it appeared Brad had been bad for much longer than she had. Possibly even for the entire duration of their dating and engagement. She shook her head in confusion. But why then would he propose to her, when he was so obviously in lust, and possibly in love, with another woman? It didn’t make any sense.
A slight turn of the knob. Dulcy stared at it, wondering if Quinn had finally come in search of her. When she’d excused herself an hour ago, she had secretly hoped he would follow. She’d needed assurance that this didn’t change anything. That he still felt what she’d glimpsed in his eyes earlier. Still felt what she’d sensed from the beginning.
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