Ambushed

by JoAnn Ross

  “Watch carefully,” he said with a slow, seductive smile. “Because next time you get to do this.”

  The sensuous idea caused a slow burn that went all the way to Sunny’s bones.

  Wanting to watch her this time, he kept his gaze on her face as his hand moved downward between their bodies and intimately cupped the still pulsing flesh, causing her to flinch.

  “Don’t worry.” He kissed her reassuringly. “I’d never hurt you. You have to trust me.”

  “I do.” Her affirmation was echoed in her passion-laced eyes.

  “That’s the girl.” He slipped one finger into her, felt her tense, then relax. “I love you like this,” he murmured, his eyes still on hers. He slipped in a second finger. “All warm. And willing.” As he began to take them out again, Clint felt her body clutch at him. “And wonderful.”

  As he moved his fingers in and out of her with a wet, silky ease, Sunny learned what it was to ache for someone. Learned what it was to feel so much, and still need more. Discovered that passion went beyond all imagined possibilities.

  Her body tensed. Her skin felt unbearably sensitized as he took her on a thrilling ride, higher and higher to where the air was thin and stole her breath, down again to where it was thick and laden with passion, and then, impossibly, drove her to even greater heights until Sunny felt suspended on a steep, rocky precipice of desire.

  Needs vibrated through her, vivid, spinning colors swirled behind her eyes, as his wicked, wondrous tongue raked her clitoris, causing her cry out his name on a strangled sob as she went plummeting over the edge.

  Clint held back, wanting to give Sunny everything he had to give, and decided that watching her eyes widen, then cloud, seeing the rosy flush, like a fever, suffusing her flesh was the sexiest thing he’d ever seen.

  Sunny gazed up at Clint, saw the pleasure her response had given him and understood that her surrender had been a gift. A gift that had empowered her, allowing her to take. And, in turn, to give. She wrapped her arms around him and pressed her open mouth against the pulsing blood beat at the base of his throat.

  “I love you,” she whispered against his damp dark skin.

  Those three little words, spoken so softly, were all that it took to cause his hard-fought control to snap.

  Although he’d tried to be patient, had fought to remain tender, the animal had taken over: the need to possess her ripped at him with sharp, vicious claws.

  “You’re mine, Sunny.” Using his superior weight to press her deep into the too soft mattress, he moved against her, his muscles taut and gleaming with passion.

  Gazing up at him, she viewed the menacing man she’d first seen holding that deadly gun. How could she have forgotten this dark side of him? How could she not have known that danger could be so erotic? So thrilling.

  Her words caught in her throat; she could only nod.

  It wasn’t enough. Just as he’d needed to watch her go over the edge, Clint needed to hear the words out loud.

  “Say it,” he insisted, rubbing against her in a way that aroused more than intimidated.

  “I’m yours,” she managed.

  He lifted her hips, his fingers digging painfully into her flesh. “Forever.”

  His eyes were aflame, his touch was going to leave bruises and his mouth was set in that grim line she hadn’t seen for days. What he was asking was impossible. But Sunny had neither the strength nor the will to tell him that sad truth now.

  “Forever.” The lie came out on a choked sob. Then, digging her fingers into his upper arms, she lifted her hips even higher off the tangled sheets and opened for him, body, mind and heart.

  Clint surged into her tight wet sheath with a single thrust, burying himself deep in her warmth. As he began to move, hard and fast, he could have sworn he smelled wildflowers.

  Then he took them both racing into the swirling, smoky darkness, where passion ruled and time had no meaning. As he gave Sunny everything he’d promised, as he took everything he so desperately needed, there was no yesterday. No tomorrow.

  There was only this suspended moment.

  He felt her convulse around him, and only then did he finally give in to his own release.

  THE EARLY MORNING sun was streaming through the window, creating dancing diamonds on the Navajo white walls. Suspended between sleep and wakefulness, Sunny considered getting up to close the drapes but decided she was too comfortable, too happy, right where she was.

  The garish striped bedspread and blanket had landed on the floor sometime during the night and the only thing covering her body was a tangle of well-worn sheet. And Clint’s arms and legs, wrapped around her, holding her close, warming her like a thick downy quilt. Her hand lay over his heart. She could feel its steady rhythm, so different from its earlier wild pounding beneath her palm.

  She let her eyes drift shut again, burrowed into his comforting embrace and allowed her mind to wander.

  Last night had been the most incredible night of her life. She’d lost track of how many times she and Clint had made love, but the last time had been well into the morning, only a few hours ago. She knew she should be exhausted, but in truth, she’d never felt more alive in her life.

  She’d never realized lovemaking could be like that. She hadn’t believed that mortals could experience magic. But Clint had proven her wrong. What they’d shared had been exhilarating, glorious and absolutely magical.

  Sunny almost laughed, but knowing Clint was going to have to climb back onto a wild bucking animal in a few hours, she didn’t want to wake him. So she merely smiled, molded herself to the warm hard wall of his bare chest and recalled in vivid detail how his roughened hands had felt like the finest grade of sandpaper as they’d moved over her body, stimulating her nerve endings until they’d crackled like heat lightning on the horizon before a mountain thunderstorm.

  And his mouth—so wicked, so hot, so greedy! It made her body yearn all over again just thinking back on all the impossible pleasures it had brought her.

  But there’d been a great deal more than mere sex involved in what had happened last night. The words she had spoken, the promise she had made would have to be dealt with.

  Her mood, which only a moment ago had been so happy, swung downward like a pendulum. Sunny pressed her lips against Clint’s chest, squeezing back the tears that threatened as she thought about the day ahead. It wouldn’t be easy, doing what she had to do. But she’d do it, Sunny vowed. For Clint. Because she loved him.

  As her mind struggled with feelings too complex to catalogue, and thoughts too depressing to think about, she closed her eyes tight and drifted back into a soft-edged sleep and dreamed of what might have been.

  13

  CLINT WATCHED SUNNY sleep, and wondered what he’d ever done in his life to deserve this miraculous second chance at love. And, although he knew it went against every vestige of the common sense he’d always prided himself on, he’d somehow fallen in love with this woman who’d literally burst into his life less than a week ago.

  He didn’t know who she was. Didn’t know anything about her, really, except she cooked like Julia Child, tasted like the sweetest bit of heaven and had a smile as bright and benevolent as a summer sun. She’d assured him that she wasn’t running away from a husband, and Clint had no choice but to believe her.

  But it wouldn’t have mattered if she was married. Because in every way, she belonged to him. She’d come out of nowhere, and had ambushed him at the darkest moment in his life. She’d stolen his heart while turning his world upside down, then had put it back into place, amazingly restored again, last night.

  And in return, he’d branded her as his own. Sunny was his, Clint vowed. Forever.

  Outside, across the street, the rodeo was coming to life. Inside, he could hear the sound of the shower in the room next door, the drone of the television, the murmur of voices. The day was beginning, whether he wanted it to or not.

  Clint found himself more than a little tempted to forgo the final da
y’s events and just stay right here in bed with Sunny.

  As if aware of his intense scrutiny, she slowly roused, blinking as she stared up at him with sleep-heavy eyes.

  “Hi,” she whispered. A new day had dawned, forcing her to face the inevitable.

  “Hi yourself.” Something was wrong. Clint sensed it; saw it in the tense set of her shoulders, the hesitancy in her eyes.

  Believing she was suffering from an understandable case of morning-after self-consciousness, he refrained from kissing her, as he’d been longing to do, and ran the back of his hand down the side of her face instead.

  “How are you feeling?”

  “Fine,” she answered promptly. The sheet had drifted down to her waist. Uncomfortable carrying on this conversation in broad daylight while wearing nothing at all, she pulled the sheet up to her chin.

  He almost laughed at her futile attempt at modesty. As if he didn’t have the memory of every ounce of that fragrant flesh imbedded in his mind. “The truth, Sunny.” He trailed his fingers around her chin, down her throat. “How are you really feeling?”

  The tender touch, meant to soothe, only succeeded in making her more nervous. “Fine,” she insisted, her frail voice telling him otherwise.

  He tugged the sheet back down, then ran a fingertip over the crests of her breasts, and frowned at the faint blackand-blue bruises marring the porcelain flesh.

  “I hurt you.”

  “You could never hurt me.” But she would hurt him, Sunny feared, reminding herself that although he might not believe it now, the end really would justify the means. No matter how unpleasant they may be.

  “Never on purpose,” he promised, unwittingly making her feel even more guilty.

  Unable to look at him, Sunny dragged her gaze out the window. “It’s almost time for the first event.”

  “Mmm.” Drawn by her scent, he nuzzled her neck. “Lucky for us I’m not in the first event.” His lips were hypnotic, seducing her into compliance. Sunny felt that now familiar drugging haze drifting over her mind. “I was watching you sleep,” he said.

  So she’d been right. She had felt him. Sunny was not encouraged by the fact that they’d established a mental link.

  “Want to know what I was thinking?”

  “That I snore?” she asked, and managed a small smile.

  “Cute, sunshine.” Because it had been too long since he’d kissed her, he touched his lips to hers.

  Her mouth seemed to have taken on a mind of its own, and clung of its own volition to his. Sunny was both relieved and disappointed when he finally broke off the sweet lingering kiss.

  “I was thinking how much I’d like to spend the day here in bed with you. But then I realized you’d probably be a little sore this morning, so I figured I might as well do some rodeoing, then come back here and let you drive me crazy again all night.” He ruffled her tousled hair and smiled down at her. “Then, I thought I’d call Mariah, who’ll be glad to take care of things for a few more days, and we could play tourist.”

  He’d picked up her hand and was idly kissing each fingertip as he talked. “You can’t come to Tombstone without seeing the O.K. Corral, then I thought maybe we’d drive to Tucson or Phoenix, and use some of my winnings to book a room in one of the resorts—maybe well even spring for a suite, with a Jacuzzi, and—”

  “Clint.” She pressed her free hand against his unshaven cheek. “I can’t.”

  He stiffened, almost imperceptibly. But Sunny, who was watching him intently, did not miss the tightening of his magnificent body, or the muscle that had suddenly clenched beneath her fingertips. “Can’t what?”

  His voice was calm and measured; his eyes were not.

  “I can’t play tourist with you.”

  “Sure you can. If you’re worried about your boss giving you a few days off, Sunny, don’t worry.” He flashed her a playful, lecherous grin that didn’t reach his ice blue eyes. “I hear the guy’s a sucker for a certain pretty woman. If you just play your cards right—”

  “I can’t play tourist with you.” She pulled away from his tender touch.

  “If you’d rather go straight back to Whiskey River—”

  “I can’t do that, either.”

  Cold anger whipped through him. “Want to tell me why not?”

  Even knowing how difficult it was going to be to leave him, Sunny had not been prepared for the pain of his anger.

  “I’ve already told you,” she managed to whisper, the words almost strangling her as her nervous hands unconsciously gathered up the edge of the sheet. “I’m not the right woman for you.”

  “Bull!” He wanted to take hold of her shoulders and shake her. “Don’t you think I know when a woman’s right for me? When I’m right for a woman?”

  He leaned forward until their foreheads were almost touching. His eyes blazed into hers, his breath was a hot wind on her face. “You may be a good actress, sweet heart, but you sure as hell aren’t good enough to fake those orgasms I gave you. If you’d shaken any harder, this place would have come down around us. And if you’d screamed any louder, someone would have called the cops.”

  The accusations were like bullets that struck directly in her heart. Sunny couldn’t believe real bullets could have been any more painful.

  “I wasn’t acting.” Her breathing was ragged, her voice trembled. “I could never have lied about that.” She swallowed a violent tremor. “But there’s more to a relationship than sex.”

  Clint stared down at her in disbelief. For a moment, it seemed his body had shut down: his mind, his heart, his lungs. On some distant level he told himself he should be grateful. It was difficult to feel the pain when you were numb.

  “And that’s all last night meant to you?” he asked in a cool, remote voice that sent a shiver down her spine. For some reason the icy anger frightened her more than the earlier hot fury.

  She nodded, unable to speak past the lump in her throat. Unable to breathe for the iron fist twisting her chest.

  He continued to stare at her for a long, silent time. Wanting to tell him all that last night had meant to her, wanting to assure him that she’d never, ever forget the magical time they’d shared, desperate to cry out that she loved him and always would until the end of time, Sunny bit her lip and turned away.

  “Damn you.” The muttered curse was followed by a riper, harsher one. She heard him gathering up his clothes, was vaguely aware of him pulling them on. And then he was gone, slamming the door behind him.

  Sunny watched as the painting of Wyatt Earp facing down the Clanton brothers tilted. Another, depicting Geronimo astride a horrendously ill-proportioned horse fell off the wall, and landed on the ugly orange carpet with a muffled thud.

  The lingering silence was suffocating. And crushing. Lowering her face to her hands, Sunny finally allowed herself to weep.

  Dora found her like that, curled up on the bed, unable to think, unable to feel.

  “Sorry to come right in,” the older woman said cautiously, “but when you didn’t answer your door, I thought you maybe fell in the shower, or…” Her voice drifted off. “Aw hell, who am I kidding? I was worried about you and came to see if you were all right.”

  “I’m fine,” Sunny mumbled into the pillow she was holding. The pillow that still carried Clint’s scent. “Why were you worried?”

  “Because Clint looks like Desperado spent the night stomping on his heart.”

  “It wasn’t the night.” Sunny sighed and closed her eyes, reliving the glorious images in her mind. “The night was wonderful.”

  “I see.” Without waiting for an invitation, Dora sat down on the bed and ran her hand down Sunny’s hair in a maternal gesture so warm and tender Sunny almost started crying again. “Sometimes those morning-afters can be a little awkward.”

  “This was more than awkward.”

  “Yeah, I kinda got that impression looking at Clint. You know, hon, although I do hate to sound like Rooster, breaking in a man is a lot like breaking in
a horse. You gotta take it slow and easy. And not rush him.”

  Although some of Rooster’s cowboyisms had gone over Sunny’s head, she understood this one. “It wasn’t that way. Actually, it’s my fault. Clint wanted more than I could give.”

  “Oh.” Although Dora sounded surprised that any woman wouldn’t be eager to scoop up a great catch like Clint Garvey, Sunny was grateful to her for keeping her thoughts to herself. “Well, you know what the Duke’s wife always said.”

  “What’s that?”

  “A gal’s gotta do what a gal’s gotta do.” When that earned a reluctant smile, Dora grinned. “That’s better. And by the way, I’m not gettin’ into your business, but Clint asked me to give you a message.”

  “Oh?”

  “Noel Giraudeau had her baby.”

  “She did?” That got Sunny’s attention. What mortal woman could ignore such happy news? “What was it?”

  “A little girl. Mariah told Clint that they named her Marisa.”

  “Marisa Giraudeau,” Sunny murmured. “That’s a lovely name.”

  “Sure is.” Dora nodded. “But the one they gave her is even better. Marisa Reardon.”

  “Reardon?”

  “Noel and Mac got married in the hospital,” Dora revealed with a grin. “Between contractions. Mariah, Tara and Jessica Ingersoll—Clint said you haven’t met her yet—stood up with her.

  “The way Mariah tells it, right after Noel promised to love, honor and cherish, she swore to kill Mac if he ever came near her again.”

  Dora’s laugh was bold and rich, encouraging an answering one from Sunny. “They’re so lucky,” she murmured.

  “True enough,” the older woman agreed. “But sometimes we can make our own luck. Not that I’m messing in your business,” she said again.

  That was far from the truth, Sunny knew, nevertheless she was grateful to have another woman to share her unhappiness with.

  “You missed the Jaycee’s pancake breakfast,” Dora said.