Theresa Michaels

by The Merry Widows Sarah

  With one hand she traced his features. “Perhaps what you said about the spirits bringing you here is true. With you holding me I’m beginning to feel a peace I can’t remember ever having. Thank you, Rio,” she whispered, and then kissed the edge of his jaw.

  “You give gifts of healing, too.” Her head rested on his broad shoulder, absorbing his strength and his heat. His arms were a haven she could steal for a little while. She had to stifle the flare of sensual awareness that made its presence known. Rio didn’t want any ties. And who could blame him. After what she had told him about herself, what man would want her.

  Rio would have to be made of stone not to feel the fine trembling in her fingers as she stroked the back of his neck. He schooled himself not to react. The darkness helped. He kept telling himself that she was upset, that she did not know what she was doing.

  But he could not find the words to tell her to stop.

  Her touch was both torment and pleasure. So equally divided that he did not know if he could stand more, or die if she ceased her caress.

  He did not want her to tell him to go. Holding her near, breathing in the scent that was hers alone did little to ease the building hunger, but it was all he had, all he allowed himself.

  “Rio?”

  He closed his eyes and steeled himself. She was going to say it now.

  But Sarah nestled her head closer so that her breath blew against his neck.

  “I…I want you to know I’ve never felt so safe with a man.” Shy and hesitant, she struggled to tell him what she was feeling, what he made her feel. “I told you that you had gifts of your own. I’ve never trusted another man. Not enough to tell him about my past. I was always afraid that I would be judged. But you didn’t judge me. You’re so special, I despair of finding the words to tell you how very special you are.”

  “Sarah, this is a mistake. Let me lay you down. You need rest. This has not been easy for you.”

  She raised her head from his shoulder, wishing now the lamp had been lit. She wanted to see him, see his eyes.

  “Am I asking too much to ask you to stay with me? I don’t want to be alone. I’ve been alone so long.”

  He couldn’t know what that admission cost her. It was as close to begging as she could come. It was also the truth. She did not want to be alone. They had both revealed secrets of the heart to each other. But it was more. There was something about Rio that had taken down every wall she had hidden behind. She felt both shattered and vulnerable, and tempering both was a renewal of spirit that he had given her. She had found a new life for herself, but Rio was still searching for his. She had no one hunting her, endangering children, ready to steal their lives and his.

  And she wanted so desperately to give something back to this man. Sarah shied from naming what more she felt.

  Now she was glad it was dark, glad that he could not look into her eyes. Her emotions roiled so close to the surface that she knew she would never be able to hide them from him.

  “Sarah,” he whispered, raising his hands to her shoulders. “I am going to leave before we are both sorry. I have nothing to offer you. And you, iszáń, have too much to give to a man.”

  “One man. You. But I won’t stop you or plead.”

  He swung her aside and rose, a darker shadow in the room, but so close she had only to reach out to touch him.

  There was no censure in her voice. She understood that he was protecting her in the only way he knew. But then she felt the brush of his hand as he reached out to her.

  “Sarah, they would hang me for what I am thinking.”

  “Who?”

  “White men. You know that. I can’t wish away what I am.”

  “There’s no one here but me. And your sons. They’re still sleeping. I want…no, I’m not asking for promises, or anything more than what you want to share.”

  “Ah, Sarah, truly the spirits of my ancestors smile down on me.”

  He touched her as if she were a small, frightened little bird he was afraid of hurting. The fierce desire he had for her, and her alone, was there, but held at bay. There was about her a softness that she had not revealed to him before this moment. She invoked the strong male drive to protect, and an even stronger drive to claim. No longer was she the widow who had faced him with rifle in hand, fleeing and then, when caught, the woman who had used her feminine strengths against him.

  And still he hesitated, protecting himself and this woman the only way he could short of walking away from her. He knew he could not leave her now. She had bared her heart to him. There was no way he would add to the cruelty she had suffered.

  “Sarah, would you understand if I said that I did not want this to happen and yet have hungered to feel your arms around me, your lips against mine? That I dreamed of you, and denied need?”

  Sarah came to her knees in the middle of the bed. Her fingers trembled as she reached up and began to unbutton Rio’s shirt. Her hands explored his body, hard and heated, his skin stretched tight over muscles. She parted the cloth, palms flat against his rib cage and pressed her cheek against his chest. Her own desire stirred as she absorbed the warmth of his body into her own.

  He lifted one knee to the bed. The shift in his stance spread his thighs. She moved to fill the space he’d made.

  She inhaled the rain-washed scent of him, the animal heat, dark and potent. A strange, frightening excitement knotted her stomach. She thought of all the times she had watched him. Her hands skimmed the long, hard shape of his thighs. Her lips parted with a breathless sigh as his fingers slid through her hair and cupped the back of her neck to lift her face up toward his.

  She braced herself against his chest, her hands splayed wide over his smooth skin. She felt the beat of his heart, the pace quick like her own.

  He was a looming dark shadow, lowering his head toward her until his breath fanned her lips. She wanted his kiss, wanted to taste again the hungry passion that left no room for lies.

  Desire for him rose so powerful within her that she shook from its force. She closed her eyes. It had been so long, too long since she had been held. And never like this, as if she were something precious, fragile almost. Or was he afraid that she truly did not know what she wanted.

  She heard his low, hungry sound before his mouth covered hers. The kiss was a wild, exploding assault on her senses.

  Sarah clung to him, trembling. The edge of his teeth held her lower lip captive. Soft moans escaped her. His arm swept down, wrapped around her hips and drew her tight against him. She felt the pulsing heat of him spread to every nerve ending.

  Sarah curled her fingers into his shoulders. He was so hard, the only giving softness found in his lips that gentled and savaged her mouth by turns until need, for him and only him, was the single thought allowed.

  The night belonged to him. Dark, forbidding and dangerous. And the storm was his, as well, like the passion he drew from her. Wild. Hot. Unknown.

  The kiss suddenly gentled, the tip of his tongue cherishing the shape of her lips. She moaned and clung to him. His warmth and his tender kiss filled her senses. Her lips parted. She offered a helpless invitation for more. His groan was filled with pleasure, his mouth took hers with need.

  “Sarah? Sarah,” he said softly against her mouth, not lifting his head at all. “Tell me to stop.”

  “I can’t.”

  Her breasts swelled, heavy with the need to be touched. The force of his kiss bent her head back. Her hands slid into the long, silky length of his hair until she held his head and drew it down.

  His mouth gentled yet again. She cried out.

  His tongue swept the inner softness of her mouth, desire threatening his control.

  Sarah jerked her head back. “Don’t,” she pleaded in a broken voice. “You can’t want me to use a whore’s kiss with you.”

  “No, Sarah, no. Is that what he told you?” His breath sawed in and out, hard and fast.

  “He said—”

  “No. No words of his. Nothing of him.
Only you and me. No more holding back. No more secrets, Sarah. I want you. All of you. Before this night is done you will forget every memory of him.”

  No chance to resist. To protest To stop him.

  Rio took her mouth with a gentle savagery that swept aside memory and reason. He tasted her as if he couldn’t get enough.

  She shuddered against his hard, rocking body. She knew she had never measured, never felt this depth of hunger for a man.

  Empty and aching. A violent trembling took hold of her. And she wanted what Rio did. All. Nothing held back.

  His body told her more clearly than words what he wanted. He swelled against her. She took what his lips offered, long and hard and deep, and fought off shyness, buried any hesitations.

  When at last he pulled away, his harsh breathing mingled with hers. She used the tip of her tongue slowly to sweep up the lingering taste of whiskey and coffee, and the heat Rio had left behind.

  He quickly stepped away from the bed. From the darkness came the rustle of cloth. She moistened her lips again, wanting to say something, unable to think what to say.

  Before he stepped closer, she removed her robe. She had just taken hold of the nightgown’s hem when his hands covered hers. Her mouth was suddenly dry.

  “Let me,” he whispered, desperate to slow things down, to regain whatever control he could. She was burning him alive.

  Sarah sat back on her heels in the middle of the bed. She used one hand to caress him from waist to thigh. His skin was damp, sleek and drawn tight. And hot. She hesitated, then touched the rigid evidence of his maleness. He shifted but made no move away from her tentative touch. His groan was one of pleasure as he clenched his hands.

  She wondered at her boldness. Very gently, and shyly, she curled her fingers around him.

  “Sarah!”

  Her hand jerked back. “What did I do? Was it wrong? You’re so strong and sleek and hot and I just wanted to…needed to touch you.”

  “Enju, iszáń. It is well, Sarah. You are so good that I stand like a green boy before you, afraid to touch, afraid that I will hurt you.”

  “You couldn’t, Rio. I know that.” Even to her own ears her voice was shaken by the emotions she felt.

  “Trust me, Sarah.”

  “I do. It’s me that I don’t trust. I have never wanted like this.”

  “I will not hurt you. I am not an animal, Sarah.”

  “I know that. I’m not afraid of you. I’m not afraid of what I’m feeling.” In the dark, she tilted her head. “Are you waiting for me to change my mind?”

  “Do you want to?” The words were wrenched from him. The fierce need to mate with her drove him wild. He shuddered, even as he forced himself to give her yet another chance to turn him away. Heated blood surged through his body until his skin stretched taut. He could barely stand as he waited in agony for her answer.

  Waited for words.

  Not the sudden move she made toward him. Not the feel of her hands shaping him from knee to thigh. Not the heated sweep of her breath over his aroused flesh.

  She kissed his hip, the tip of her tongue tasting him. “No,” she whispered against his skin. “I can’t stop now, Rio. I’m aching. It almost hurts. Come to me. I—”

  “Hush, Sarah, hush.” He gathered her close and held her tight. “I wanted to be gentle with you. I need that.” Lies. He did not feel gentle. He was battling the deepest of male urges to possess.

  Sarah didn’t argue. She couldn’t remember a time when Judd had been gentle, not once they had been married. She scattered kisses over his taut belly, a move she made without thought, more from need and even instinct. She used the tip of her tongue to taste him again, then the edge of her teeth in a delicate bite. Once more she drew back, shocked at herself. His low, hungry sound filled her ears.

  Rio curved his hands over her shoulders, then glided across the soft cotton covering to her even softer skin. His thumbs met and gently measured the pulse beating in her throat. She made a little moaning sound when he moved his caress down her arms to her wrists, where he found her pulse rapid and erratic.

  Her arms were slender but strong. Like her long legs. He already knew what she felt like stretched out beneath him.

  But she had been fighting him then and he had added to her fear with his threats.

  Sarah was not fighting him now.

  He leaned over and gathered the edge of her nightgown. He drew the cloth up slowly, his hands caressing her thighs. He felt the tremors, just as he inhaled the faint scent that rose from the cloth. More potent was the feminine scent of arousal that came from Sarah herself.

  “Rio?”

  He calmed himself, then raised the drift of bunched cloth over her breasts. He really did not trust himself not to fall on her and sheathe himself in passionate heat Had it been anyone else…but it was not. This was Sarah. Sarah who had not been with a man in a long, long time. He knew that she wanted him. It was agony to prolong this. She had already loosened the ribbon tie. The nightgown easily slipped over her head. He tossed it aside.

  Their lips met as Sarah shifted to make room for him on her bed. He followed her down on the mattress, covering her with his strong, hard body.

  So long.

  Rio struggled to remember if he had ever touched a woman as soft as Sarah. He felt no disloyalty to his wife’s memory, for she was a maid and Apache. There were no thoughts of soft bodies when work had been all she knew.

  The taste of passion on her lips was new, as potent as whiskey. She arched upward as his hand curved over her full breast. A wordless sound escaped from her lips as his thumb brushed the rapidly firming peak. He leaned to the side and slipped one arm beneath her as he lifted her to his mouth.

  “Rio? Oh, please…I…” Her voice broke. His mouth, soft and heated, closed over her tightly drawn nipple. Blood rushed and swelled her breast, the feeling so exquisite that she cried out, arching her back, silently asking for more.

  It wasn’t enough. Sarah, at first afraid that he would hurt her, now found herself gripping his head and pulling him harder against her. She wanted him, needed him with a desperation that she could not begin to explain. Soft whimpers came from her lips. She twisted against him.

  Her head fell back, offering him her bare throat. Rio tested the smooth curve with kisses and love bites that had her crying his name with husky sounds. He pressed her closer, then closer still, as if he wanted to draw her inside himself.

  The warm, hungry kisses she scattered over his skin wherever she could reach nearly drove him over the edge.

  Sarah tried to regain a sense of sanity. Then he touched her, parting her thighs, stroking, readying her. She bit back cries of surrender as she trembled and opened to him, yielding pleasure as he found softer, hotter flesh.

  Her cries scored him to his soul. The hunger he had leashed flared up, shortening his breath, making his blood run heavily, hardening his body that was already rawhide taut. He caressed the sultry heat of her that he needed to touch as much as he needed water to live.

  His groan was lost as her hands slid down to cup the hard, throbbing male flesh. She stroked and caressed him, murmuring wordless sounds against his lips when one fingertip caught the tiny drop of moisture that escaped him.

  Rio rolled to his back and lifted her over him. Her plea of want and need was all he heard. Her long legs were pressed alongside his. He stroked from her shoulders down her back, cupping her slender hips, rubbing her softly against him.

  Sarah braced her hands against his shoulders, her fingers digging deep as she gripped him. Within her, tiny explosions built to an unbearable tension that made her believe she would die if she could not have him.

  A moan built to a cry. His hands guided her hips. She wanted him deep inside her, joined to where there was no Rio, no Sarah, but only one flesh. No matter how she twisted, or implored him, he took her gently, by tiny increments.

  “Rio, please…”

  A passionate cry that echoed the one in his mind. Bone-deep
need demanded that he fully claim and possess this woman. But Rio stopped himself driving into her, knowing that once he did, once he was fully sheathed within her warmth, he would never withdraw.

  Sarah. He had never felt so much the man as he listened to the pleasure cries of his lover. The trembling release that went through her was shared, and he could not stop from pressing deeper, ignoring the warning screaming in his mind. She lured him with her graceful abandon to go deeper still, for she was hot, sleek and making time cease. Once more her body tightened, and he held to the edge, just until the very last moment.

  With a wrenching cry, his fingers bit into her hips, lifting her up and away as he spilled his seed in an endless release that he could never, ever share with her.

  Sarah had felt him move through her like a storm, all raging lightning and thunderbolts, but her last cry of pleasure turned bittersweet.

  “Why? Why, Rio?”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Sarah wished she had the strength to move away from him. Tears stung her eyes, eyes that had already cried too much.

  “Why?” she begged.

  Rio could only hold her. He ignored her attempt to push away from him. He felt raw, exposed and almost vulnerable. How could she forget? How could she ask why?

  He clenched his jaw until his teeth ground together. He was angry, cheated by his own act, and yet with the bit of sanity he clung to, knew he should be thankful that he had hung on to the last shred of control to protect her.

  He held her, rocking gently. The storm of emotion still seethed like a coil of thunderheads ready to unleash its power on them again.

  “Tell me. Please, Rio, tell me why.”

  “You forget what I am,” he said in a ragged voice. “I cannot. I am an Apache half-breed, Sarah. You are a white woman. I will leave you this memory and no more. Do you understand now?”

  “How could you think that matters to me? You’re a man, Rio. I see you as nothing else. More man than I’ve known. You made love to me. And yes, this is a memory to savor and treasure. But keep your lies to yourself. Don’t ever lie to me about this.”