Delilah's Flame

by Parnell, Andrea

  “Don’t. Not yet,” she whispered, feeling all restraint fall away. “Stay here.”

  She owed him a debt. She was anxious and ready to begin paying. She would give Tabor his week, be the wanton woman he desired. For him she would be Delilah, in body, in mind. She would be all he expected Delilah to be, but she would do it on her terms, not his. And when it was over, she would go back to being Lilah Damon, go back to living within her proper upbringing. Tabor would keep her secret. She knew him well enough now to be confident of that.

  There was one worry, though. She knew, too, he was a man who would insist upon doing right by a girl he had spoiled. That she couldn’t have. He must never know Delilah the seductress, the siren, existed only in the fancy of her audience.

  Lilah smiled softly. Early in her first tour she had let herself listen to Carrie, a jaded saloon girl, bemoaning the ways of men. How her ears had tingled hearing the things a man did with a woman. But she had needed to know if she was to convincingly present herself as a tasty tart. So she had asked the ways that pleased, the ways that excited a man, and Carrie had told her in infinite detail. Tabor Stanton and all California believed Delilah an expensive courtesan. She would make sure that when a week had passed, Tabor believed it still.

  There was the problem of her maidenhead. But Carrie said no matter how sweet a man talked or how gentle he started, he knew nothing but his own rutting need when he took a whore.

  Would Tabor be different? She hoped so. Somehow it mattered very much that he would. What a quandary. But she couldn’t have it both ways. She would have to hope all the myths, all the warnings matronly women gave to young girls were wrong, and that virginity was not such an evident thing that a man really knew if he was the first.

  “Lilah,” Tabor answered after a moment, “I don’t think I can stay here. A man can’t stay so close to a woman without wanting to bed her, especially one as beautiful as you.” His voice broke with huskiness. “I said I wouldn’t rush you. Don’t make me a liar.”

  She shook her head gently and spoke from her heart, without thinking, without hearing that her words were not those of a worldly woman. Her fingers slid into the thatch of dark curls on his chest. Her eyes were luminous with desire.

  “Show me how beautiful it can be, Tabor,” she pleaded. “I need to know. I have to know or I’ll be afraid from now on.”

  Anger ripped through him, but he kept it hidden. She was thinking of Chapman and the perverted things he had threatened her with. It was enough to make a woman afraid to ever give herself to a man again. Once more he wished his bullet had struck the mark. But looking into Lilah’s face, he forgot Chapman. Gently he rolled to his side so that her body molded to his, eyes and lips only inches apart.

  “Do you know what you’re asking?”

  “I know. I know you saved my life.”

  “Lilah.” A pain squeezed his heart as he whispered her name. Did she think she had to repay him for that? Did she think she had to repay him with her body? Was that what he had shown her of himself? He thought of his demands on her; he supposed it was. “I don’t want you out of gratitude,” he said sadly. “I never would have forced you to go through—”

  She stroked his lips with her fingers, silencing him.

  “It isn’t gratitude, though I feel that too. It’s more. I know being close to you makes me feel warm and safe. That may not last. Maybe when we leave here everything will be like it was yesterday on the trail. But this time, this hour, is outside all that. I want you, Tabor,” she whispered. “I want you to make love to me. I want it to be beautiful.”

  That was a plea he couldn’t resist, not with her hand again slipping inside his shirt and her fingers teasing over his skin. Her voice trembled like that of a shy virgin feeling the first awakening of passion. There was so much about her he didn’t understand. Delilah had known other men. He had heard her with one of them. Was it crazy to feel that this woman, so soft and yielding in his arms, was someone else?

  Why did he wonder? She wanted him, and for reasons that had nothing to do with those that had hurled them together. For a time they would be a man and a woman with no past and no future hampering what they shared. No matter what might spring up between them later, he knew that this intimacy would be a sweet memory to hold in his heart.

  Tabor’s stubbled cheek brushed Lilah’s smooth one. She laughed as his bristly beard scrubbed her lightly. He’d have to be careful not to mar her soft skin. He hoped he could remember, because when their lips met and sealed together, every other thought seemed to fade back into the night.

  Lilah knelt beside him and opened his shirt, helping him slip it off. She giggled as he pulled off his boots, finding it funny that he’d slept in them. The gunbelt was beside him. He had kept one hand on it all night in the unlikely event anyone should disturb them. He pushed it away, not out of reach but where they wouldn’t roll on it.

  Tabor untied the few ribbons on her camisole that hadn’t worked loose while she slept. His usually dexterous fingers seemed to be a handful of thumbs. But when she was out of the garment, they were nimble as ever, skimming her flesh, caressing the satiny skin, learning the curves and valleys of her breasts.

  Her thoughts spun in a vortex of her own making. She had stepped out of reality because what she felt and what she wanted to make him feel went beyond all but imagination. She cast off her petticoats and, unabashedly naked, helped him out of his trousers. She inhaled sharply. He was the first man she had seen naked, but this time the sight of his manhood rising from the dark bush that held it awed rather than frightened her.

  She forced her eyes to look elsewhere, to see all of him. She saw power and strength his clothes kept hidden from all other eyes. He was a beautiful man. Was that a thing to think? That a man could be beautiful?

  Again the sight of that decidedly male part of him drew her eyes. She lowered her head so that her tumbling curls hid the sudden blush. He need not know he was the first nude man she had seen. How would he know? He thought she had taken many men before him. She feared he would feel obligated if he knew otherwise. That would never do. Her future was set, and it held no room for Tabor Stanton.

  Last night she had seen the dark soul of death. Today she wanted all the brightness of life. She had chosen this man and this moment for her deflowering. That was Delilah’s right. That was her right.

  A smile spread across her lips. Aunt Emily would be apoplectic if she knew. Emily had done her best to instill righteousness and morality in her. But here and now, surrounded by the beauty of a wild land, Lilah wanted only the laws of nature to show her right and wrong. Those were the laws she had known as a child. Beneath a Victorian facade, those were the principles that still guided her.

  It seemed apropos that she had the decorous guise of Delilah to slip into. From the heart of Delilah she would feel no shame. Tabor was a man. She wanted him. She yearned to be filled with the joy of womanhood.

  Lilah lifted her head. Her eyes slanted, the innocence gone from her smile. Tabor, now seated on the blanket, saw her face change. He half-expected her hair to darken to brilliant red. Delilah. This was Delilah. Her moves were practiced, her voice huskier. She knelt beside him.

  “Lie back,” she whispered, touching his shoulders and giving him a gentle nudge.

  Tabor lowered himself to his back. To allow a woman to take the lead in lovemaking was new to him. But Delilah was determined and he was not a man to turn back from the unknown. Resting on her knees, she leaned across him, sprinkling kisses over his face. That was all it took to tighten his loins. Tabor reached for her. But she gently pushed his hands down beside him.

  “Hold them here,” she said.

  Tabor did as she asked, but only by imposing an iron will on himself. Blood pounded in his brain and the pleasure and the passion mounted as her hands moved over him. He had to close his eyes against the thought of her ever having done to another man what she did to him.

  Her fingers trembled as she moved them in a sensuou
s massage over Tabor’s lean, rock-hard body. She hoped he wouldn’t realize the trembling wasn’t as much from passion as from nervousness. Carrie had made it sound so easy to touch a man in this way, but now that she was into it, she was sure her arousal was even greater than his. Not that he wasn’t aroused. There was no hiding that manly staff or the heat of it when her hand came near. She hadn’t been able to make herself touch him there yet. Oh, she wanted to, and Carrie had told her how a man liked it done. But would she get it right? Where was all Delilah’s confidence now?

  Tabor moaned as she slid her fingers through the line of hair running from his chest to his loins. Delilah knew her craft, how to tantalize a man, how to drive him near to exploding with erotic strokes and random kisses, her nipples now and then grazing his skin as if by accident. How long did she think he could endure such sweet torture?

  Lilah, fortifying herself, eased her hand around his manhood and felt the pulsing heat it contained. Her touch was light but sent a jolt of desire careening through her. A moist, hot flame spread onto her thighs. Should that be happening?

  “God’s blood, woman! Do you think I’m made of iron?”

  She hadn’t remembered he could go from perfect stillness to the speed of a leaping deer. But in half an instant she found herself on her back and was held there by Tabor’s heavy thigh across her legs.

  Tabor moaned as his mouth moved to hers. He kissed her with much less vigor than his passion demanded. But somehow within the fire he remembered the damage his heavy beard would do to her skin. He was gentle too as he moved his mouth to her breasts, letting the velvet warmth of his tongue ply her tender, smooth flesh. He moved lower, his lips nuzzling the soft, flat plane of her belly.

  She couldn’t stop an outcry of pleasure. Carrie had never told her about this unbearable longing, this fire licking unceasingly at the core of her.

  “Tabor, please.” There were no ready words to explain what she wanted, but he would understand. He must understand. And he did. Tabor nudged her legs apart and knelt between them. He hadn’t let himself look at the fiery red curls on the gentle swell above her thighs. Now he couldn’t keep his eyes and hands away. He touched her gently, separating, massaging, tugging the down curls, teasing that sensuous place, driving her to the peak of ecstasy. Lilah’s soft moans told him when to stop. She cried his name when his hand left her.

  Their eyes met as he eased down on her and probed at the warm, wet center of her. Only one small boundary separated them. Lilah longed with all of her being to have it shattered. Her hands cupped his buttocks, urging him on. She could think of nothing but unlocking the woman inside her, the one who so longed to know all the mysteries of love. Her whole body felt as if it were ablaze with need for him.

  Tabor was surprised by her tightness, but too sodden with passion to think of it as more than another of her treasures. With her nails cutting into his flesh and a moan on his lips, he plunged inside her. He felt the tearing as the virginal membrane gave way. He heard her muffled cry of pain but she was soon thrusting high to meet him and he was plunging with her into the dark flames of passion. Now her soft cries were of pleasure, her rhythm as fast as his own, as ecstasy consumed them both in the hottest of fires.

  “Oh, love,” he cried. “Lilah, my love,” as the flames took him.

  Chapter 15

  Bare as a babe, Lilah stretched languorously. The sun had risen high in the blue sky while she and Tabor lay quietly in each other’s arms. She felt freer, lighter, and so much more womanly than she could have imagined. The pain had lasted but a second; the joy lingered like the fragrance of rich perfume.

  She felt Tabor stir beside her and smiled. For her the smile had secret meaning. She had heard it said a man received a rare treasure when he took a virgin. Well, here she was feeling as if she were the one blessed. This new power of womanhood was a priceless gift. Tabor had given it to her. The irony was, he knew nothing about it. He hadn’t noticed the rending of her maidenhead. Oh, she felt a little sad about that. Such a wonderful event, surely the most wonderful of her life, was worthy of a celebration, and she had to hold back her happiness.

  “I’ll get some water,” he said. “We should have been on the trail hours ago.” He picked up his trousers, and with them draped over his arm, stood above her, noting the wistfulness in her soft eyes, and for a moment he was hesitant to leave. But before the temptation grew too strong, before he lay down to again intertwine himself with her beneath the blanket, he turned away.

  Lilah allowed herself an unchallenged view as he walked off toward the creek. He was a pleasure to the eyes. Powerful calves and thighs carried him smoothly over the ground. Muscles flexed in the firm buttocks and rippled in his shoulders as he swung his arms. She marveled at the way that strong frame had found the gentle harmony of hers and how together they had sung nature’s sweetest song. Who could have dreamed of such a perfect fitting? She thought it no small marvel that Tabor’s body matched and moved with hers as if he had been cast to the mold.

  He was back before her wandering thoughts settled, handing her a canteen. She rolled from beneath the woolly cover and bared her skin to the sun. Again he stood and stared for a moment; her beauty took his breath away. His eyes followed the twist and turn of tangled red-gold curls which hung down her back like trailing tendrils of wild vine. His eyes strayed onward to the V of darker curls, those which had been soft as down beneath his probing fingers. The stir of desire began anew within him, and a mellow warmth filled his heart. Lilah accepted his admiration and stood before him like a proud Venus. He wondered how much false courage that took.

  “I’m afraid there’s nothing to wash with. Maybe one of your petticoats,” he suggested.

  Lilah took the canteen and poured the cool water over her shoulders, shivering beneath the cleansing rivulets that ran over breasts, belly, and thighs. Grinning, Tabor politely turned away as she attended more delicate places. It was then she noticed the tenderness between her thighs and the flakes of dried blood clinging to them. Hurriedly she washed them away, certain Tabor had failed to see those reminders of her virginity.

  Done with bathing, Lilah took his suggestion and used her remaining petticoat as a towel and dried her skin, saving a part of the garment to use as a clean bandage for his wound.

  While she washed, Tabor tucked his shirt into his trousers and slid his feet into his boots. By the time Lilah was finished bathing, he brought her the yellow dress he had found last night. She slipped it on, then, on tiptoes, reached up to untie the strip of cloth around his neck.

  The wound was closed but she wanted to cleanse it before rebandaging. “You’ll have to kneel,” she said, soaking a piece of cloth with water from the canteen. “You’re much too tall for me to do this properly with you standing.”

  A light twinkling deep in his gray eyes, Tabor knelt. Delilah had brought him to his knees. All along, hadn’t he feared that was what she would do to him? Hadn’t that been his worry while he had chased her all over the country like a man in pursuit of a big-game animal? The prey had turned on the hunter. Here he was the one downed, a man with an arrow in his heart, and for a lying, two-faced woman.

  He almost laughed out loud. She had been a virgin. And she had tried to pass herself off as a man-wise strumpet. He had half-believed she was a strumpet and had totally enjoyed playing along with her deceitful game. Hell! What point in fooling himself? He had believed her a fancified harlot until that last sweet moment when he pushed inside her.

  Lilah’s hands were gentle as she dabbed his wound with the wet cloth, her fingers warm against his skin as she tied the fresh bandage around his neck. He didn’t like the thought of what he had done. Why the devil hadn’t she told him to begin with that she was a virgin? Didn’t she know that would have made a difference? Why was she still keeping quiet about it now?

  “All done?” he asked softly as she tied the ends of the bandage.

  Lilah nodded and folded the scraps of her petticoat. Tabor sighed. Was she going
to confess her deception? Or was she waiting for him to mention the fact? Facing her, he stared questioningly down into sky-blue eyes and saw the doors behind them closed tight. The truth of the situation came to him. She wasn’t going to say a thing. For some reason, the conniving wench wanted him to think she was a tarnished woman.

  Having noticed the scratches and bruises on her bare feet, Tabor bade her to wait while he got the horses.

  Lilah felt let down. Why did he keep looking at her as if he wanted to laugh? Was this the way a man treated a woman he had just made love to for the first time? Did the tenderness last only until a man’s blood cooled? And what about all the loving things he had whispered to her? Where were those adoring words now?

  Tabor saw her throw back her head and imperiously heave out her chest. She was playing Delilah to the hilt. A quick surge of heat hit his loins. He supposed she knew just how provocative she was, standing that way. Damn her! If she didn’t want him to stay here all day making love to her, she’d better tone down the act.

  Tabor refilled the canteen and tied it to his saddle, then led Lilah’s horse to her. “Let’s get moving,” he said brusquely.

  She interpreted the terseness in his voice as impatience. She didn’t like at all the ease with which he could switch his mind to other things, like catching up with Sarah. She supposed that was the way it was when a man finished with a loose woman. But it didn’t seem fair that she still felt all warm and achy inside, just looking at him.

  “I’m waiting for you,” she responded crisply as she grabbed the saddle horn and tried to swing herself up, though she could barely reach the stirrup.

  Tabor hurried to her side. “Let me help.” His hands closed around her waist, but instead of lifting her to the saddle, he pulled her aside and into his arms. “One kiss won’t hold us up too long,” he said softly. Crushing her to him, he kissed her long, savoring the honey-sweet softness of her mouth.