Tracker’s Sin

by Sarah McCarty

  His eyelids flickered. “You think you’re woman enough to handle me, sweets?”

  Was she? She didn’t know. And neither did he. “Are you willing to let me try?”

  “No.”

  He was lying. She knew he was lying. He wanted her. And she wanted him. Holding his gaze, she reached up and slid her hand across his cheek. She paused, dragging her fingertips downward. He didn’t have much of a beard. She frowned at the vague sense that there should be a beard. She waited for a memory, an emotion to follow the fragment of a realization. There was nothing except the vague acknowledgment of there once being a beard. Opening her hand, she slid it farther up his face. The edges of the scar abraded her palm.

  He didn’t look away. His eyes studied hers. Again she had that sense that he saw more than she remembered, held answers she needed. “What are you doing, Ari?” he asked at last.

  “I’m not sure.” She frowned, concentrating on the feelings. “I think I’m experimenting.”

  “With what?”

  “How it feels to be alive.”

  “Sweets, what you’re doing is more like asking to know what it would be like to die.”

  “Not for me.” She already knew how to die. It was living she struggled with. A fight she might have lost if not for Miguel. And now this man…. She threaded her fingers through Tracker’s hair. It was softer to the touch than she expected. Like heavy dark silk. “To me, you feel like life.”

  “Because I make you remember?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t remember anything, but with you, I don’t care.” She touched her thumb to his lips the way he had to hers. How could she begin to explain to him the freedom that came from feeling part of the world? The joy of feeling pleasure? The sense of coming home? “You just feel…right.”

  His eyes narrowed and his mouth tilted up in a sensual quirk. He had beautiful eyes. A rich brown so deep, like fine chocolate. And his mouth. Such a beautiful mouth.

  “Right?”

  She pressed her thumb against his lips again. “Don’t laugh, but I think I’ve been waiting for you, Tracker Ochoa.”

  This close, she couldn’t miss his start. “Hell.”

  “Does that mean you still want to paddle my butt?”

  That small smile grew. “Yeah, but not for the same reason.”

  She blinked. He wanted to spank her for pleasure? “Why don’t you just start with kissing me?”

  The shake of his head sent his hair spilling onto her breast. Another connection.

  “You don’t know what you’re asking.”

  “I know kissing sounds better than spanking.”

  His lips quirked at the corner. “Sweets, you’d be safer taking the spanking.”

  She shrugged, not looking away. “Maybe I’m tired of being safe.”

  There was possession in the cupping of his hand around hers, hunger in the press, acceptance in the withdrawal. “I like you being safe.”

  Nothing was colder than the moment when he took his hand away. Nothing more annoying than yet another person telling her what she felt, what she wanted. “You don’t know me.”

  He took a step back. “But I’ve known a lot of women like you. Women who want excitement for the moment. Only problem with the plan is I’m not your toy. Bad enough that claiming you in town is likely to get me killed.”

  She took a step forward. Then a bigger one, so that her skirt wrapped around his legs. He made her feel so brazen. So sexy. “Since when are you afraid of being killed?”

  Ari had a point, Tracker realized. Since when was he afraid to take what life offered? Since when did he worry about the future? Hell, since when did he think he’d have a future?

  “I’m not.” He motioned to Miguel, who’d fallen asleep. “Put him down.”

  Ari hesitated, her hand stroking the baby’s head. Her tongue flicked over her lips, a pink dart of temptation. Tracker wanted that tongue in his mouth, on his skin. His cock flexed in protest when she bit her lip. Damn it, he wanted that kiss.

  She squared her shoulders. It was a different woman who held his gaze, confident, passionate. It had to be an illusion. Tracker stepped back, making room for Ari’s escape. She gave him a look that was completely unreadable, turned in the opposite direction than he expected and placed Miguel carefully on the bed. The boy didn’t wake as Ari took the pillow and pulled it down, bracketing her son between it and the wall. When she turned back to Tracker, her chin came up.

  “Prove it.”

  “Daring me?” he asked, not sure which answer he desired. A “no” that would put an end to this, or a “yes” that would draw him in.

  She smiled a siren’s smile. One that no man could resist. “Throwing myself at you didn’t work.”

  The hell it hadn’t. “You want the kiss that badly?”

  She nodded and took a step forward. “Oh, yes.”

  He took a step of his own, his gaze drawn to the press of her nipples against the cotton of her blouse. She wasn’t faking it. She wanted him. “Why?”

  “I already told you.” Her next step brought her within reach.

  He caught the curl that tumbled from her bun. It wound around his finger. “Because you want to feel alive?”

  Her fingers curled around his wrist as if she was afraid he’d bolt. She didn’t have to worry. He wasn’t going anywhere. “With you.”

  She reiterated that, as if it was important. And maybe it was to her. No woman liked to feel she had needs just any man could fulfill.

  Tracker nodded, stretching out that curl, letting it go, watching it bounce back, as if the trauma had never happened. Was that what she was doing? Bouncing back from the trauma of her past? “Because you think I’m different.”

  “I know you’re different.”

  “You don’t remember anything that happened before you arrived here.”

  If she did, she wouldn’t be within a hundred yards of him.

  She took the last step, sliding her hands up over his shoulders. Hot little hands that sent shivers of pure sensation down his spine. “Are you always this argumentative?”

  “Probably.”

  Her nails pressed into the back of his neck. “Just my luck.”

  Or his. He brushed his fingers over her cheek, snagging the remnants of the bun at the nape of her neck. Two tugs and the braid came free, unfurling down her back. He followed the trail with his fingers, tracing the subtle indentations of her spine to the hollow of her back before retracing the path and drawing her gently forward. Giving her time to reconsider.

  Damn it all to hell, the one thing she had to be sure about was kissing him. There was only so much honor a man had when faced with such temptation.

  “Don’t you want to kiss me, Tracker?” she asked. As if there was any doubt…

  “I want to do a hell of a lot more than that.” His cock was rock hard, ready to go off like a green boy. And all he’d done was run his fingers up her spine.

  A shadow flitted through the clear blue of her eyes, gone in a heartbeat. He was making her nervous.

  “Could we just try a kiss?” she murmured.

  “We can do whatever the hell you want.”

  Shit, now he was swearing. A touch of his thumb to her cheek tilted her face to the side. He lowered his head, watching and waiting for that moment when her past came rushing forward, waiting for the protest that would save them both. It didn’t happen. There was just the flash fire build of anticipation searing through him, stopping his breath in his lungs, his heart in his chest the split second before his mouth touched hers, and then there was no going back. No going anywhere but into the fire that threatened to burn him from the inside out.

  Her mouth was sweet, soft and compliant beneath his. She kissed like a virgin with no idea what to do.

  He pulled back. Her eyelids lifted slowly. The softest of smiles touched her lips. Hell, she didn’t have a clue.

  “I like that.”

  So did he. He liked being the one to teach her about pleasur
e.

  “Good.” He smoothed his thumb over her lips, pulling the lower one down until her mouth parted, moist and ready for his attentions. “Now, this time let’s try it with your mouth open.”

  She blinked and caught her breath in shock, or anticipation. He couldn’t tell, and truth be told, didn’t want to know. Shock would mean he had to pull away, and he needed to know how she tasted. Needed it with everything in him. And if it was anticipation? Hell, if he began to believe she was anticipating that kiss, he’d lose control.

  Replacing his thumb with his mouth, he fitted his lips to hers. Perfect. A perfect fit. In a haze of rising desire, he stroked his tongue over the plump flesh, giving her time to pull back. She had to pull back. For both their sakes.

  She came forward, arching her body into his, giving the soft, whimpered gasp of pleasure he craved, dreaded, relished. She wasn’t herself, wasn’t for him. He clung to the knowledge, battling for sanity as her hips pressed to his, rubbing when he expected her to pull away, giving when he expected her to flee.

  “Tracker.” She breathed his name into his mouth like an answered prayer.

  He caught her hips in his hands, stilling their restless movement. “Don’t.”

  “Oh, yes.” Her eyes opened as he ended the kiss. Try as he might, he couldn’t find a lick of fear in their depths. Only an abundance of anticipation. “I knew it would be this good with you.”

  So had he. Son of a bitch, so had he.

  “You’re going to regret this.” Later, when her memories returned, she was going to hate him.

  Her leg slid up his. Her foot hooked behind his knee, trapping them together. “No, I won’t.”

  He didn’t argue. He was done arguing. Done fighting her, himself. He gathered her skirts in his hand as he kissed his way down her neck. She liked that, moaning and shivering every time he kissed the soft white flesh. His own memories flashed through his mind. His father’s anger, his mother’s face rigid in death. His first love, his first heartbreak, his first understanding of what it meant to be Indian in a white world. His first whore, his second, third. Faces blended together in a mass of indifference he’d tried to maintain.

  “Oh my God, Tracker.”

  An indifference that was nowhere around with Ari.

  “Yes, Tracker.”

  He lifted her up, kissing her breasts through her shirt. She moaned his name again, her thighs naturally parting. He wouldn’t allow her to be indifferent with him.

  A world of hurt was coming his way when this was over, but for now there was lightning-hot pleasure, breathless joy and the delusion that he mattered. To her.

  Her hands tugged at his hair. “Kiss me again.”

  “Ah, hell.” He needed his ass kicked. His mouth slammed down on hers as he pushed her up against the wall and stepped between her thighs.

  “Yes.” The jubilant sigh of satisfaction fanned his desire into a flickering flame. The woman kissed like hell on fire, innocence and passion riding instinct in a potent combination that shredded his control and left him on the verge of coming.

  “Sweets.” His cock found its home between her thighs. “We have to stop.”

  “No.”

  Her hips pulsed in counterpoint to his thrust, sliding her pussy along his cock, gasping every time the thick head caught on her clit. Son of a bitch, even the layers of clothing between them couldn’t hide the heat of her desire. She wanted him, and if he unbuttoned his pants and opened the slit in her drawers, he could be inside her.

  Tracker dropped his forehead to Ari’s as he unbuttoned his pants. He wouldn’t take her, but he needed a taste. Just a taste of that sweet heat.

  “You don’t want this with me,” he moaned, anger and frustrated desire hoarsening his voice to a growl.

  But he wanted it with her. He wanted his cock deep in her pussy. He wanted to fuck her hard and deep until the impossible happened. Until she was his.

  Ari shook her head, a denial of his words or her need? He didn’t care. He worked his cock free. It surged against her, falling naturally into the niche between her thighs, leaving just a thin layer of linen between him and that hot pussy. His hips surged forward, pressing the fat head into the pad of her pussy. Even through the material she was soft and giving. Eager. It would take so little to give them what they both wanted.

  He looked down. He couldn’t see anything but the press of her nipples against her blouse, and her skirt bunched between them. Damn, he wanted to see what he could only imagine. The swollen folds, wet with her desire, open and hungry for his mouth, his cock. He pressed against her once, twice, the urge to thrust riding him hard.

  Her answer was a moan and a tightening of her legs around him. “Don’t stop.”

  He kissed her hard and fast, allowing himself just that much of a taste. His cock throbbed and burned as he pushed against her. “We have to.”

  “No. I want you.” Her eyes opened. Her legs spread wider. “I want you.”

  He snarled with the impossibility of it, the perfection of it, bending his knees to get a better angle. He moaned as his cock slipped between the folds of delicate material, finding flesh even more delicate, sliding through the proof of her desire into the well of her vagina, notching there. She held his cock in a kiss of heat for an endless moment.

  “It means nothing more than this,” he growled, keeping from tearing into her through sheer force of will. He’d been searching for her for so long, and now she was here, offering him everything when he could have nothing.

  “Yes.” She struggled against him, rocking her hips and trying to coax him deeper. “Just this.”

  “There can be nothing more than this.”

  Her head fell back against the wall, exposing the creamy line of her throat. A pulse of his hips emphasized his point. Her pussy parted, the supple muscles working over the head of his cock in inviting flexes as they struggled to accept him. The flesh of her throat was sweet and salty against his lips. He strung hard, biting kisses down her skin, nipping at the juncture of her shoulder and neck, lingering when she moaned and tilted her head, giving him better access.

  “Take me.”

  He thrust deep, and she took him fully. “Yes. Oh yes!”

  Pulling back, he thrust again and again. Her pussy accepted more and more until she held him balls deep, her strong muscles rippling along his cock, inviting more. Close. They were so close. His cock flexed. His balls tingled in prerelease. It was so good.

  The barn door creaked. Familiar footsteps scuffed across the hay-strewn floor. In the periphery of his mind, Tracker knew he had only seconds to let Ari go if he wanted to preserve her reputation. His feet wouldn’t obey his order. He was so close. She was so close. “Vincente’s com—”

  Ari didn’t let him finish. With surprising strength, she held him to her, grinding down on his cock. His snarl blended with her moan of pleasure. He couldn’t wrench away, couldn’t face Vincente, couldn’t save her reputation. Couldn’t stop the orgasm from taking over as her pussy spasmed on his cock and she cried out. Son of a bitch. Tracker pressed a kiss to her lips. She was perfect. She was his.

  A pistol cocked. He couldn’t summon the strength to reach for his knife. If Vincente pulled the trigger, it was no more than he deserved.

  “This is how you treat my hospitality?”

  Ari jumped, and Tracker’s cock flexed within her at the inadvertent caress. He drew her face against his chest, giving her a place to hide as he slowly separated their bodies.

  With a wave of the gun, the old man indicated the door.

  “Take your son and go to the house, Ari.”

  Ari’s “no” seared Tracker’s heart.

  He smoothed his hand down her cheek. “Go. I’ll settle this.”

  She grabbed her son and fled.

  When the barn door closed behind her, Vincente said, “You will marry her.”

  Shit. “She deserves better.”

  The old man didn’t budge, just kept that rifle trained on Tracker’s gut. “M
aybe, but you are her choice.”

  Son of a bitch. Tracker stared at the gun, stared at the resolution in Vincente’s eyes, remembered the hot clasp of Ari’s pussy.

  He hadn’t planned on this.

  6

  The night was peaceful. The small pond a mile east of the Morales ranch was bathed in the faint light of a half-moon. Branches swayed in the soft breeze, their reflections dancing across the glassy surface of the water in a rhythmic ballet. Somewhere in the stillness of the night, Shadow waited.

  Tracker struck a sulfur on his boot and lit a smoke. It’d been a hell of a week, in which one puzzle had been solved and another developed. The solution to the first puzzle was good. Ari was found. The second was not so good. Vincente was insisting he marry her. Josefina was against it. For seven days he’d suffered burned meals and angry looks. Where Ari stood was a question mark. As soon as he’d protested the notion, she’d fallen back into politeness, as if it were a shield against rejection.

  She believed herself to have been married to a Mexican. She had a child who looked more Mexican than white. To her, there was no reason for the flatness of his refusal. She didn’t know the truth and he couldn’t give it. A white wife for a man like him would be more trouble than she was worth in most cases, but when that woman was Ari? Shit. He flicked the smoke into the water. That would be a dream come true. And Vincente had known it and announced the bans despite Tracker’s protests.

  “You never did have any respect for a good smoke.”

  “Hello, Shadow.”

  Buster tossed his head and whickered a greeting of his own.

  His brother stepped away from the tree he’d been leaning against and crossed to his side. “Took you long enough to figure out I was here.”

  Tracker shrugged. “Guess that means I’m buying next time we get to town.”

  They’d been playing this more sophisticated form of hide-and-seek since they were kids.

  Shadow motioned for his fixings. Tracker handed them over. “Consider my forgiving the debt a wedding present.”

  “You heard?”

  “Not much else anybody’s talking about around here. There’s all kinds of stories about how it happened, but somehow Ari Morales landed as a groom the great Tracker Ochoa.”