"Yep." She knocked back his hat from her brow. She was wearing a catlike smirk.
"Would you mind tossing me my clothes?"
"Not at all."
His rolled up bandanna came sailing his way.
When none of his other belongings followed, he raised his eyebrows in mock protest. "And what am I supposed to do with this?"
"Well, I don't know. What would you like to do with it?"
"Is that a trick question?"
"Ooh. Naughty."
Humoring her, he flipped his sopping hair over his shoulder to tie his neckerchief around his neck. "Does your brother know that you're rendezvousing with a mostly naked man in the wilds?"
"Mostly naked? Darn. I should have kept that bandanna."
Hiding his amusement, he donned a stern expression and splayed his hands across his hips. "Don't think I can't reach up there and give you the dunking you deserve, princess."
"Princess?" She tossed her head. "I've been fishing and cannonballing in this river long before you ever heard of Blue Thunder, Texican. And just for the record, I catch tadpoles and crayfish, too."
"Dressed like that?" he countered archly.
"Certainly not. I was wearing pigtails—and only pigtails—at the time."
Considering how his pecker reacted to that delightful confession, he thought it best to change the subject—and fast.
"Where's Cass?"
"I haven't the vaguest idea."
He didn't believe her for a second.
"Are you tracking him?" she added a little uncertainly. "He said you released him from jail."
Jesse's jaw twitched. He'd done Cass the favor of not telling Luke about Cass's hollow boot heel. But like Marshal Ellerbe in Stanton, the wily Chickasaw had been dealing with outlaws long enough to guess that Cass must have concealed a widdy somewhere on his body.
Not only had Luke confiscated Cass's lock pick, he'd relieved Cass of the stiletto that he kept tucked in his collar, as well as the vial of blinding powder (used for escapes) that almost no lawman ever found secreted away in the hem of Cass's duster.
Clearly, somebody had broken Cass out of jail. And Jesse suspected that somebody had been Collie.
"What are you doing here?" Jesse countered. "Rendezvousing with renegades?"
"Good heavens," Sera protested playfully. "The man wears a badge for a week, and suddenly he sees illicit behavior in every activity."
"You avoided my question."
"Well, if you really must know, Marshal Do-Right, I'm going on a vision quest."
"A vision quest, huh?"
"That's right. And might I say—so far—I am thoroughly enjoying the vision."
He frowned. He wasn't certain how he should respond to her quip. Considering how Cass had spilled the beans yesterday—and in the most callous way possible—Jesse was stunned that Sera would flirt with a Colored man in the same, familiar way. That she would stand up there on that rock, ogling his naked chest. That she would openly proclaim her admiration for his copper-colored skin.
On the one hand, Jesse was relieved by this turn of events. He was glad he didn't have to keep playing games, pretending that he was White in Sera's company—as short as their reunion must be.
On the other hand, he had a desperate, aching need to make her his. A forbidden need. A need that could get him lynched and Sera branded with public shame.
The fact that she kept staring at him as if he were a hunk of chocolate that she wanted to devour, was only making that need worse. He knew his lust for her was dangerous, that it could ruin her life. For that reason, he'd been determined to keep an iron restraint on his pecker. He'd never wanted to look in the mirror and hate the man he saw.
But now the bigger problem was his heart. It was breaking. He didn't want to ride away. He didn't want to leave Sera. He didn't want her to marry some uppity White, law-abiding husband and have a passel of blue-eyed babies with him.
"Who taught you about vision quests?" he demanded hoarsely.
"Oh... a couple of Cherokee medicine women."
His smile grew strained. "You know Cherokee medicine women?"
Sera cocked her head. "Well... in a manner of speaking. I can see spirits, you know," she added gently.
Chills danced down his spine—chills that had absolutely nothing to do with the breeze gusting over his wet flesh. He noticed, then, that Sera wasn't wearing riding gauntlets. Or kid gloves. Or any other kind of gloves, for that matter.
Half afraid to know, he asked, "Where do you see these spirits?"
"Oh..." She waved her hand. "Around. Talking Raven likes to visit Eden, because of the baby. Talking Raven used to be a midwife, you know. And then there's Sweet Meadow. I haven't seen much of her around the house lately. Not since you moved into town."
"Sweet Meadow?" Jesse repeated suspiciously.
"She told me that's what Hiawassee means in the White man's tongue."
Jesse's heart was pounding so hard, he thought for certain she must hear it. "You... you've seen Hiawassee?"
She squatted down on the boulder before his shoulders, her eyes alight with a tenderness that stole his breath away.
"Your grandmother's never far from your side, Jesse. She watches over you. She loves you every bit as much as I do. She helped God bring us together."
Jesse swallowed. Hard.
"How long have you known that Hiawassee was my grandmother?"
"Ever since she appeared to me, that day we were talking in the stairwell." Her hand cupped his cheek. When her thumb caressed his skin, it felt like velvet sunshine.
"I wanted to tell you I saw her, Jesse. I did," she whispered fervently. "But Hiawassee told me not to. I never understood why, but... but I think it was because you're so private about your Cherokee ways. And because they're so sacred to you."
A tear spilled down his cheek. She'd known he was Cherokee when she'd come to him in the stable? When she'd let him pleasure her three wild, reckless times? When she'd cried like her world was ending, because he'd broken her heart?
She caught his teardrop on her thumb. "I love you so much," she whispered, the mist of her own tears creeping across her eyes. "I know you have to ride away. I understand why. I'm not going to argue. I just... I just want to lay with you, Jesse. For my first time. I know I'll always remember it and... and I want the thing that I remember most to be that I was loved by you."
A shudder moved through him. "Sera..." Her name came out half prayer, half groan. She was offering him everything he'd dreamed of: to be accepted into her world. To be the man she chose above all others. To be loved, even though his skin was a different color than hers.
Before he'd met Sera, he'd been too bitter to hope for love, and too angry to look for it. But if Sera would have him, then he wanted to be the kind of man whom she could respect. The kind of man her children could look up to.
A man who lived by a moral code.
He wrapped his fingers around her wrist. He pressed a kiss into her palm. "I will lay with you, right here, right now," he said fervently. "On one condition."
"What's that?"
Her eyes had deepened to a vibrant azure. He could feel her pulse speeding beneath his fingertips.
"Promise you'll marry me."
She caught her breath. Her eyes grew bigger than blue moons. "Y-You really mean it?"
"Just try getting rid of me."
She laughed. She cried. She threw her arms around his neck. "Yes! Oh, Jesse, yes! I promise!"
Her elation did strange things to inside. They felt all jittery and warm—a cross between jelly and melted butter. He had to set her back up on the boulder, before she could topple head-first over his shoulder into the river.
"And after that, we'll have a private Cherokee ceremony," he growled. "Just between us." He was afraid she would object.
"Jesse Quaid, I will marry you any way you let me!"
Her joy was infectious. He was tempted to laugh.
But their union—and the fruit of their un
ion—was much too sacred for him to surrender to the elation that fizzed like cherry sarsaparilla through his veins. He caught her face between his hands. He gazed deeply into those luminous, tear-glazed eyes.
"I want you to understand, Sera, that if you marry me, we'll have children."
"Uh-huh."
"Colored children."
"Uh-huh."
"The boys will be barred from White men's saloons—"
"Worse things could happen," she interjected dryly.
"If they're girls, they'll have difficulty finding White husbands."
"Only if they're as lucky as their mama."
"Please think this through," he whispered, his heart in his hands. "There's still Taggart. And I may have to go to jail for a spell—"
"Are you testing me again?"
He didn't think he could bear it if she changed her mind about loving him. Or if the harsh reality of his past made her trade him for a White, law-abiding, uncomplicated man when the time came to raise her family.
"I just want you to be certain," he whispered, forcing the words past the lump in his throat. "You'll be mine for keeps, Sera. No turning back."
"For better or worse? In good times and bad?" she murmured, stroking back the wet strands of his hair.
He nodded. His throat hurt too much to speak.
"You're the man I've been praying for my whole life." The glow in her eyes made his heart swell. It left no room for doubt. "You couldn't be more perfect, if God had forged you from stardust and sprinkled you with gold."
He chuckled at her accolade. "That's a mighty tall order."
"Jesse Quaid, I do declare, you're blushing!"
"Just above the neck, sweetheart," he rallied gamely.
She grinned, treating him to a show of naughty dimples. "So what's happening in the murky depths below?"
Rather than answer, he clasped her hand. He waded beside the boulder, tugging her gently in the direction of his bedroll, which was spread upon the eastern riverbank. He enjoyed the way her breath caught as water cascaded off his lean flanks to reveal his arousal. He especially liked the way her pupils slitted, like a Himalayan cat's, and her lips curved in such an appreciative way.
"Let me touch you, Jesse," she murmured, dropping his boots and clothes in a heap beside his blankets.
He removed his Stetson from her head, sliding his fingers through her riotous mass of curls.
"I'm all yours, Sera. Touch me any way you like."
He closed his eyes when her lips touched his throat, gently sucking. Her velvet fingers splayed over his shoulders and his pectoral muscles, before sliding over his ribs. She smelled like sunshine and wildflowers and springtime in the woods. He inhaled deeply, rubbing his cheek against her silken hair.
She grew bolder, kneading the small of his spine, squeezing his buttocks. He was tempted to growl. It didn't take long for her to find the courage to stroke his shaft.
"You're so beautiful," she breathed.
That shy, heartfelt praise did more to harden him than any sly smile or come-hither look from dozens of Calico Queens who'd petted him in erotically scandalous ways.
"Kiss me," he rasped, raising her mouth to his.
And she did—joyfully, eagerly, unabashedly.
Sera's mind was still spinning to think that Jesse was making her dreams come true. To feel the way his muscles rippled like velvet steel beneath her palms, to hear his throaty little rumbles of pleasure when she performed the petting tricks that he'd taught her, was as heady as champagne. She wanted to kiss him all over, to stroke him and squeeze him and rub against him, flesh to flesh, until those jungle-cat eyes smoldered with desire.
"You're overdressed," he growled against her throat, tugging impatiently at the buttons of her bodice.
She laughed huskily, biting his ear. "Did I say you could undress me?"
"You're going down, sweetheart."
"Oh, no. You first."
They play wrestled, and she surprised him, hooking a boot heel behind his knee. He took the fall like a gentleman, protecting her from the ground, allowing her to scramble on top of his hips.
"Now where did a preacher's daughter learn to wrestle like an Indian?" he demanded good naturedly, letting her pin his magnificent, copper-colored shoulders to the ground.
She grinned. "I was raised with brothers, remember?"
"I'll wager it was Rafe."
"That's only because you never knew Gabriel."
"Your tadpole-hunting accomplice?" He was tugging her blouse free of the waistband of her riding skirt.
She grabbed his prowling hands. "You, my dear marshal, are in serious danger of becoming hogtied with that bandanna." She twined her fingers through his, rubbing her femininity playfully over the hard, hot length of his manhood.
"And you, minx, are in serious danger of—" His threat ended on a throttled gasp as she maneuvered her hips below his thighs and indulged in a long-awaited feast. She reveled in the way he arched his spine, clutching her hands tighter.
"Who taught you how to do that?" he half-panted, half-growled. "I'll kill him."
"You did, lawman. Resistance is futile."
He chuckled—a low throaty sound. "Think I'm at your mercy, huh?"
She shrieked when he rolled her, stretching her hands above her head, deftly pinning her with his hip. She blew a curl off her forehead and glared into his dancing, emerald eyes.
"Not fair!"
"All's fair in love and war," he murmured, nuzzling her lips.
Moments later, his playful cat's paw had sneaked up the billowing leg of her split, tweed skirt, bypassing every defense of linen and lace.
"Jesse," she moaned, one hand clutching desperately at his hair, the other trying its futile best to reach between his thighs.
"Take off your jacket," he growled against her ear.
"But I want—"
"I know what you want," he whispered, teasing a thick, warm libation from her maiden's head.
A whimper tore from her lips; he silenced her with a hungry kiss. Soon his magic fingers had her panting and writhing and tearing impatiently at buttons and boots until she was as naked as he was.
"All my life, I've prayed for a woman like you," he murmured, and the light shining from those radiant, jewel-colored eyes stole her breath away. "I knew, from the first moment I saw you, that Great Spirit had sent you to me. You're everything I've always wanted, Sera. With you, I am complete."
A tear trickled past her lashes. He tenderly brushed it away. "What we do here today, we do before God," he said. "It's as sacred to me as any marriage vow. Are you still willing to give yourself to me?"
She nodded, so full of love, that she could barely speak. "There could never be anyone else for me, Jesse."
Tears welled in his eyes. "You bless me with so much."
He kissed her tenderly, sweetly. In her heart, she knew he was sealing their pact. She had no doubt, no fear, only a blissful sense of yearning as his warm, gentle hands cupped her breasts and stroked her limbs, making her ache to be part of him.
Her thighs trembled open, but he delayed their union, giving her pleasure in other ways. Their mingled hearts sounded like thunder, pounding in perfect time. She found herself shivering and shuddering, wanting so much more than his sly, expert finger, milking silky cream from her core.
As if sensing her frustration, he clasped her hand around his shaft, holding her fingers there. Again and again, he rubbed the thick, potent font of his virility against her yielding door. A sparking heat coiled faster and faster inside her womb, and she arched helplessly, yearning to be closer, begging to be taken.
"Guide me home, love."
She did so, gasping to feel his fullness glide deep inside her, awed by the wonder and the intimacy of their first union.
Then he was kissing her, and she couldn't form another coherent thought. All she could do was move and breathe with him, feeling his love flow through her, feeling the rapture of being cherished beyond every hope and prayer by
the man who was giving her his body, heart and soul.
"Tsi-ge-yu-i," he whispered in Cherokee. "I love you, Sera."
She clasped him closer, crying out his name as the golden waves of pleasure crested, lapping at her core. She felt him shudder, felt the throb of his sacred essence pulse to the center of her being.
"You are the keeper of my heart, angel," he murmured, stroking her hair, kissing away her ecstatic tears. "We are one now, forever."
Time ceased to exist as he cradled her in his arms, dragging the corners of his bedroll over her nakedness. She lay dazed, dreamy and drugged by love, gazing into bottomless green eyes that glowed like the sun. All her tomorrows were shining in those pools of infinite caring. She felt so grateful, so blessed.
She let her head sink to his chest. Her eyes fluttered closed.
She dozed.
Her elation began to ebb. Slowly at first, then ever more persistently, she grew chilled. Something urgent and alarming began to gnaw at the fringes of her consciousness. She grew restless. Despite the warmth of Jesse's body, despite the heat of the rising sun and the swath of wool that he'd tucked around her hips and shoulders, she couldn't stop shivering.
She woke with a gasp, goosebumps rampaging over her flesh.
"Sera." Jesse's worry was palpable. He touched her cheek. "What's wrong?"
"C-Cass." Her teeth were actually chattering. She'd never felt so cold in her life. She began to suspect that Gabriel was nearby, trying to warn her. "Something happened to Cass."
Sera's goosebumps were infectious. Chills galloped up and down Jesse's spine.
"You dreamed about Cass?"
She nodded uncertainly. Her eyes were growing vacant. "I-I think so. I can't remember. I just know we have to leave this place. We have to hurry. They're coming, Jesse."
"Who's coming?"
"The Scarecrow and the Coyote."
Jesse battled his sense of the macabre as he handed Sera's riding tweeds to her. His grandmother had been a Seer. He understood why Sera's eyes had grown glazed and dilated. She was having a vision. A vision of danger.
"What else should I know?"
"They want Black Bart's treasure."
Her hands were wracked by tremors. She had trouble fastening the buttons of her blouse. When he reached for her bodice, trying to help, she pushed him away. She started rocking. He suspected she was only half aware of what she was doing.
Seduced by an Angel (Velvet Lies, Book 3) Page 27