And when at last she lay naked beside him, the whole of her splendorous beauty revealed to him, he took her into his arms and kissed her.
Russia clung to him, powerful and vivid desire glowing inside her. His mouth brushed hers lightly, extending an invitation to her. Parting her lips, she felt a wild surge of pleasure burst through her when he settled his mouth more firmly over hers.
She reveled in her own surrender to him. She yearned to be conquered, mastered by this man who she knew held the key that would unlock the mysterious feelings pulsing through her. “Zamora,” she urged him, feeling his tongue sweep across her lips.
“Si, paloma. Si,” he acquiesced softly, knowingly. Leaning over her, he took her breast into his mouth and suckled before lifting his head and placing whisper-soft kisses along the delicate slope of her neck. He savored the odd but disturbingly arousing scent of clove clinging to her moist skin. His hand glided slowly down her belly, down to the juncture of her thighs, where finally he cupped her intimately.
Russia gasped when he slid his finger deeply into her silken warmth, his palm beginning the slow, round and round rhythm known only to lovers. She clutched at his hair, his shoulder. The pleasure, the sweet-painful pleasure… His bath had begun it, the demand in his black gaze had heightened it, and now she hoped desperately that his body would fulfill it.
Santiago felt her pushing into his hand, seeking that which he had every intention of giving her. He saw pleasure flit across her face, but knew she hadn’t yet reached her peak.
Minutes passed. He continued to caress her, anticipating her climax, his palm and fingers maintaining their rhythm.
Russia’s breath came in short pants now. It was near, something wonderful, some sort of grand finale. She sensed she was right at the brink of it.
But no matter how she struggled to throw herself toward it, she couldn’t seem to reach it. Her muscles began to tremble with exhaustion, scream with exertion. Demanding more of them, she labored harder, gasping with both fatigue and the pleasure that seemed only to taunt her instead of satisfying her.
Santiago smoothed another finger into her, filling her a bit more, his palm never ceasing its tiny, pressing circling. Watching her face carefully, he waited in tense, hot silence for her to feel fulfillment.
But time went on. And on. Yet she didn’t find the bliss he wanted to give her.
Russia stilled; her body could do no more. A sense of deep sorrow overcame her. She closed her eyes and pulled Santiago’s hand to her chest.
A myriad of emotions swept through him. It angered him that it hadn’t happened for her. It saddened him that she lay there with such profound disillusionment etched on her flushed face.
And it bewildered him that they both had tried so hard and failed so miserably. Every part of him wanted to try again. All night if necessary. With his body this time. With all of him. Inside her. Perhaps then…
But as he continued to observe her, he realized his wishes would have to wait. Her weariness was evident. “Russia,” he said, his voice heavy with all the emotions he was experiencing, “what did you feel when I touched you?”
Opening her eyes, she wondered how to put the feelings into words. “It— It was somethin’ slow and good and happy. Like a itsy-bitsy grin that little by little grows into laughter. But the laughter…it didn’t never come. I—I cain’t explain it good. I ain’t never feeled it before tonight.”
He was so astonished, he couldn’t speak. Part of him wanted to believe she was playing her game again, toying with him. But another side of him caught and recognized the glow of candor in her eyes and the brush of innocence in her voice.
He couldn’t understand how she could be so ignorant of sensual pleasure. “Russia—”
“I’ve heared it can happen fer women. But— Since it ain’t never happened to me, I never thought it was too important. Never wasted time even thinkin’ about it.”
“But it is important, Russia. It’s very important.”
She knew now he was right. Assailed by a sense of bitter wretchedness, she turned away from him. Curling her body into a tight little ball, she closed herself off completely. “There must be somethin’ wrong with me. Somethin’ real wrong.” Inside, outside, she added silently. Dear God, what had Wirt Avery done to her?
“What is it that’s wrong?” Santiago asked, her heartache tearing at him. “Russia, tell me what it is so I can—”
“Fix it? Like you was gonna fix the problem I had earlier when I was cryin’? You cain’t fix that one, Zamora, and you cain’t fix this one neither. They’re the sorta problems that cain’t git no fixin’.”
He hated the defeat in her voice. It was so contrary to what he knew about her. So unlike the happy and outrageous girl he knew her to be.
He tried to take her in his arms, wanting to hold her close. But when she stiffened, instinct warned him to allow her to do as she would. “Russia,” he began, searching for the right words, “I know you’re upset, paloma. But— But we’ve got time. There will be other—”
“No.” Closing her eyes, she winced with inner pain. How unfair it was! To be given real proof that intimacy with a man could be pleasurable, to want that pleasure, to try hard to reach it, and then to learn that something was so wrong with her that it prevented her from ever knowing that fulfillment.
Something wrong with her. Lord in heaven, what was the total extent of those injuries she’d suffered that terrible night?
That night. That night so filled with fear, pain, and blood.
Hatred, sorrow, and fear battled for dominance inside her. “I ain’t gonna talk about this no more,” she whispered. “Not never, ever again, hear?”
“But, Russia—”
“The somethin’ wrong with me— Yeah, real wrong. I—” She broke off, struggling with rising embarrassment. She felt so ashamed of her inability to respond the way Santiago wanted her to. And she felt angry, too. Angry and bitter that so many things had been taken from her that long-ago night. God, she hadn’t even realized how much.
Fury at the injustice of it all overshadowed her humiliation. “So what if there’s somethin’ wrong with me?” she flared. “It don’t make a bit o’ difference nohow! I ain’t got no use a’tall fer them feelin’s, got that? I ain’t never needed ’em before, and I cain’t think of a single good reason why I need ’em now! I can fake ’em real good!”
He grabbed her shoulders, twisting her to face him. “Not with me,” he warned her. “You will not pretend with me, Russia.”
“Yeah?” she taunted him, rage driving her onward. “Well, jist how the hell will you know what I’m feelin’ or not feelin’? I can do all that moanin’ and pretendin’ so good that no man I’ve ever been with has suspected it ain’t real. And that, Santiago Zamora, is exactly what I’ll keep on doin’. With you and any other man I decide to let into my bed!”
He sucked in a deep, shuddering breath and felt the thunder of fury rattle through his frame. “Paloma. Dove… Soiled dove.” The words came from him on a ragged sigh, a pain-filled whisper.
“It’s what I am,” she snapped. “Did you fergit that?”
“Yes, and I liked forgetting! Dammit, why did you have to remind me?”
She sat straight up, her eyes flashing. “Well, you’re the one who said it was about time fer me to perform! Did you fergit that, too?”
He bolted out of bed, ramming his fingers through his hair. “Yes! Yes, I forgot that, too! I always forget what you are until you say or do something that makes me remember! Why? For God’s sake, why?”
“Why what?” she shouted in return.
“Why do you have to be a whore, dammit! Why do you do what you do, Russia?”
With all her heart, she longed to end the fight before it got out of hand. She and Santiago had been so gentle with each other only minutes ago. They’d shared a sweet closeness she’d never had with any other man.
But bitterness and despair filled her. Memories of that horrible night lingered in her
mind. Realizations of the results of the assault continued to torment her.
And now Santiago was in a rage over what she herself hated but was forced to do!
She couldn’t seem to find the tender words or soft voice that might have tempered the hostility. Lifting her chin, she glared at him. “What is it with you and whores?” she demanded, determined to hide her shame from him. “Why do you hate ’em so much? I know they ain’t the properest women in the world, but they ain’t the worstest neither!”
“This discussion is over,” he seethed. “As is this night. Go to sleep. We leave before sunrise.”
He stalked over to the window and jerked it open. Leaning his hands on the sill, he took deep breaths of the cool night air. A brisk wind whipped his hair across his cheeks.
Likewise, thoughts lashed inside him. Russia was right. He had started the encounter with every intention of forcing her to perform. He had wanted to see if there really was a whore behind her guileless eyes. Instead, he’d responded to her innocence. Instead, he’d treated her as he would a virgin.
Instead, he’d done everything he could to give her what he now believed she’d never experienced.
“I do it to survive,” she informed him suddenly, tremulously. “I ain’t ready to die yet, so I do it to keep on livin’.”
Her soft voice wafted into him. He didn’t want to hear it, but he couldn’t ignore it. “There are other jobs,” he answered stiffly. “Other things you could do.”
“Not with Wirt follerin’ me there ain’t.”
For the thousandth time since meeting her, he wondered why Avery was following her. But he was simply too mad to ask. “Go to sleep.”
“Why do you hate women like me? Soiled doves. Ain’t that what you called ’em?”
He stared so hard at the moon that it soon became a fuzzy white blotch in the black sky. Graciela. The one-eyed man. The dagger.
He lifted his hand, touching a finger to the scar on his cheek…the reminder of the night that had marked the beginning of sixteen long years of exile. He inhaled sharply, struggling to control the torturous emotions brought on by thoughts of his own hardened ways.
Russia watched his powerful shoulders rise with each ragged breath he took. His unwillingness to speak to her added to her pain.
But he was hurting, too, she realized. Real bad things were going on inside him. And she had ample proof that those things were somehow connected to what she did for a living. It was almost as if she could actually see the devils he held within himself. She winced, thinking of how they probably carried pitchforks and were jabbing at his heart, his soul, his mind.
The memory of their lovemaking came to her. He’d tried to please her, tried to bring her the feelings she’d never known before. He was the first man who’d ever even realized she’d never experienced those feelings, much less tried to give them to her. He’d been so gentle, so concerned.
Tenderness swept over her. The deep need to comfort him rose inside her. But how could she do that when he wouldn’t look at her, let alone even come near her?
“Santiago,” she murmured achingly, “don’t hate me. Please don’t hate me. Santiago…”
At the sound of his name, his first name, his body went rigid. Santiago, she’d said softly, intimately. Santiago. So many years had passed since anyone had called him by his Christian name. He was usually addressed as “Sir,” or “Mr. Zamora,” and sometimes “Mr. Zamora, sir.”
And now Russia had said his name. Santa Maria, he’d almost forgotten what it sounded like.
“Santiago?” she prompted. “Do you hate me?”
“Go to sleep.” He’d intended to shout the order, but instead, he heard the whisper of something gentle in his voice.
She continued to watch him, sensing many things about him. He looked so lonely, standing over there by the window all by himself. She remembered he’d told her once that he liked being a loner. She’d believed him then. She didn’t anymore.
“Come to bed, Santiago. Sleep with me.”
At her suggestion, he frowned. He’d never actually slept with a harlot. He used them well, then left their beds immediately. For that matter, he’d never slept with any woman, strumpet or not. No woman he’d ever known had invited him to stay for the night. No doubt they all believed he’d murder them in their beds.
So he slept alone. Every night. Every long, endless night after long, endless night.
“Santiago, please sleep with me. Please?”
“Why?” He failed to growl the word the way he’d meant to.
She sighed. Because you don’t want to be lonely any more ‘n I do, she explained silently. “Because when you was holdin’ me a minute ago? Well, I feeled so safe in your arms. Like a million bad and dangerous things could come into this here room, and not a one of ’em would be able to git me. I don’t feel safe very often, y’know. I— You can go on hatin’ me if that’s what you’re plumb nelly bent on doin’, but couldn’t you hold me and hate me at the same time?”
He shut the window. Without trying to understand why he was doing what he was doing, he returned to the bed and lay down with her. With one arm beneath her, the other over her, he pulled her close to him. “Go to sleep.”
“Can I hold onto you like this?” She turned onto her side, curling her arm around his neck and her leg around his hips. “Can I?”
God, it felt so good to be held like this, he thought. Felt so oddly pleasant to know he was actually going to sleep in a woman’s soft arms. “If you insist, I don’t see that I have much choice. Now go to sleep.”
In no time at all, she did exactly that, her warm breath whispering across his chest. He lay very still, staring at the candlelit ceiling and trying his damnedest to sort through the tangle of emotions inside him.
She was a whore. And he was really going to sleep with her. And she felt soft and sweet in his arms. And he liked the sound of her little breaths and the feel of her heartbeat next to his chest. Why?
She was a strumpet. And he’d given ten thousand dollars away today for her sake. A veritable fortune to townspeople who believed only the worst about him. And for what? A hotel he would never set foot in. Why?
She was a little trollop. And her tears touched something deep inside him. Why?
A harlot was what she was. And he’d broken a man’s nose because of her. And it had felt good to do it. He wasn’t a stranger to violence, but he never derived any enjoyment from it. Until today. Until he’d slammed his fist into Newt’s stupid face. Why?
The questions hammered through him, bringing every memory he had of her, starting with when he’d first seen her…when she’d fallen down those stairs in the saloon in Hamlett. Some of the recollections made him frown; some caused him to smile. Others forced him to roll his eyes in exasperation and grit his teeth in anger. And then there were several that twisted his mouth into lines of impatience.
But there was one memory that stood out from all the rest, the way a stray seed becomes a flower away from the mass of others.
He closed his eyes and concentrated on it, allowing, welcoming every emotion it brought. Astonishment was one of them, as was a strong sense of wonder. Tenderness thrummed inside him, and so did warmth. A real special warmth, the kind of heat that seemed to melt through him and make him feel real cozy—as if it were freezing cold outside and he were wrapped in a thick blanket.
He would never, not as long as he lived, forget the way she’d defended him in the cafe. The way her strange but beautiful eyes had blazed with anger when she’d realized the depth of the waitress’s unjustifiable fear of him. The way she’d confronted all the people in the kitchen who were gawking at him and whispering about the grisly tales they’d heard about him. The way she’d tried to prove to them that he wasn’t what they believed he was.
She’d championed him. He was two hundred pounds of solid gunfighter, and she was a slender little thing whose only weapon was her sharp tongue. And she’d used it. For him. After he’d sat right there and
told her he wouldn’t help her out of her predicament with Marshal Wilkens, she’d still taken up the gauntlet for him.
No one had ever done that for him before today. He would keep the memory sheltered in his heart forever.
His fingers slipping through her soft, fragrant hair, he pondered what it was he felt for her. He came up with no firm answer.
But, God help him, it wasn’t hatred.
Chapter Eight
Listening to the steady clip-clop of their mounts’ hooves as the animals picked their way over the hard, rocky dirt, Santiago cast a sideways glance at Russia. She’d been quiet ever since they’d left Rock Springs several hours ago. As much as it irritated him to admit it, he missed her nonstop, senseless chatter.
He knew the reasons for their uneasiness with each other. The events of last night were apparently weighing just as heavily on her as they were on him, and it was obvious to him that she didn’t want to discuss them. Russia loved talking more than anyone he’d ever known, and the very fact that she’d been so quiet today told him she would not respond favorably if he brought the uncomfortable subject up.
Uncertain of what to do or how to act, he slid his gaze back to the dry and endless landscape ahead and saw a cloud of dust in the distance. Squinting, he realized it was a horse and rider.
Russia watched him lay a hand on one of his guns. “Do you always git ready to shoot when y’see dust clouds comin’?”
He never took his eyes away from the approaching rider. “Yes.”
Pondering his tense features, Russia felt a wave of sadness for him. He was always alert, ready for danger of any kind, and suspicious of everyone he met. It seemed to her that he was completely lacking in trust. Then again, she mused, his way of life demanded it.
She couldn’t understand why anyone would desire that kind of life, and wondered why Santiago had chosen it. Unable to fathom the reason, she returned her attention to the advancing horse. In only a few more moments the rider pulled his lathered mount to a halt next to her cart.
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