His breath seemed ragged and uneven, and all at once I felt shy after so much boldness. But Sawyer seemed to understand. He slid his hand across my chest and up my throat until it cupped my face. He tilted my chin until I looked into his eyes.
“I’ve been wondering how to get you out of that since I first saw you,” he said softly.
And he kissed me again. My bare breasts pressed against his chest, skin against skin, heat fusing us together. I pushed his shirt off his shoulders, and we pulled and freed and fumbled until we both stood naked. Sawyer smiled at me again, and the look in his eyes spoke of passion and possession. I was his now, and I let him see that he would be mine in exchange. He lifted me in his strong arms and set me on the bed, following me down to the softness of the mattress. It was too late to turn back, but the thought of it didn’t cross my mind. I wanted him. I think I loved him. It didn’t matter what reasoning or sense belonged to the feelings.
I felt the dark danger inside him. The ruthlessness of a man who lived outside the boundaries of civilization, who slept beneath the stars because walls were too confining. I felt his desire to change that, to become one with a life more gentle, more willing to give and less likely to take. In his own way, he sought after stability here, with the saloon. If not an acceptable way of society, then at least a predictable one.
And I realized that my needs had changed so that I wanted it, too. I couldn’t go back to the confines of my old life. To marry one of the boys back home and live life like I’d been raised to do. In too short a time I’d changed, and that forging of a new woman couldn’t be undone. I belonged here now, in the arms of Sawyer McCready, and I would do everything in my power to stay there.
He didn’t ask me if I was sure in my giving. I saw from the look in his eyes that he knew already. There was power there, the power of knowing I was his to take, to love, to pleasure. His hands slid over my body, and my skin seemed to light wherever he touched. I wanted my own dose of the heady stuff shadowing his eyes. I ran my fingertips down his spine as I pressed my mouth to his collarbone and the hollows beneath it. When I reached his bare buttocks, I froze for a moment. The intimacy of touching him here, where the skin was white against the sun-darkened waist, somehow matched any we’d had so far. He felt my uncertainty and looked up from my breast. The cool air where his mouth had been warm and wet added yet another sensation to the thousands assaulting my senses in a delicious rush.
For a moment I thought he might ask if I’d changed my mind. I thought he might play the honorable gentleman and leave me with my virtue. But when I looked into his eyes I realized he had no intentions of the kind. His smile was slow and seductive as he shifted his weight so he lay right beside me, his chest, hips, and thighs a burning magnet down the length of my body. He propped his head up and looked at my nakedness with bold possession.
I was breathing hard and fast as his fingers moved to parts of me that no fingers had touched before. The shock of skin on skin, of the gentle exploration of his fingers, wet from the need inside me, arched my body into his. He watched my face as he touched and teased, and this, I realized, was more intimate, more consuming than the feel of his hands. He stared deeply into my eyes, refusing to let me turn away, refusing to let me hide the tide of emotion, sensation, overwhelming longing that hit me with each gentle movement. When he slipped a finger inside that tight place no one had ever invaded, I caught my breath and moaned.
He teased me until his fingers were slick, watching my face for signs of my needs. I felt raw and exposed and utterly at his mercy. He laid me back and kissed me like I was the beginning, like I was the end. Our hot breath mixed and made me giddy. My skin burned, my body ached for something I didn’t know how to ask for.
Sawyer worked his way down my throat, my breasts, his mouth hot silk on my nipples, his teeth nipping just enough to make me shiver. His hands were rough, his touch tender, and his kiss a spark that lit me like a torch.
I didn’t understand his destination until I felt the soft swipe of his tongue a second before his mouth covered my sex, and the exquisite feeling of heat and friction brought my hips up and made me cry out.
I was embarrassed and enthralled, captive as he licked and sucked and drove me to an edge I wanted to leap from. He murmured words I was too crazed to hear, and then he slipped one of his clever fingers inside me and I was soaring into pleasure and pain so perfect that I cried out his name.
He smiled when he rose to kiss my mouth, a devastating, knowing smile that made me blush even as I spread my legs for him. I kissed him deeply, my taste on his tongue, and that excited me even more. I felt the rigid tip of him and then the slow, insistent pressure as he moved inside. There was pain, but in some unfathomable way, it was good pain. For a moment, concern darkened his eyes and he held still, watching me for a signal. I took in a shaky breath and kissed him, pulling the breath of him into my lungs as he moved again, long and slow, then deep, then shallow. The rhythm of it excited me in the same way plunging heights and dizzying falls could.
I kept my mouth to his, so he would taste the fear and the thrill of my emotions while I drank the dark mystery he unveiled for me. Our bodies were slick with sweat as he struggled to please me while not hurting me and I fought to drive him beyond the ability to tell. I felt a building deep inside, a pounding of pressure, a swirling of tension that rose up and melted down until I was hot and trembling. My body arched in a dance Sawyer knew well, and he shifted, changing the rhythm of his music to make me writhe and tighten around him until we were both unleashed by the song. I heard my own cry and then his lower moan of release. He collapsed on top of me, his weight welcome in the aftermath of pleasure. I knew then that I would willingly spend the rest of my life seeking another chance to move him this way.
CHAPTER 31
Jonathan had one of Reilly’s arms twisted behind his back, held hard and tight and he pressed the long barrel to the base of Reilly’s skull. Every time he moved, the gun dug deeper, and it felt like his arm would snap out of its socket at any moment.
His eyes met Gracie’s as she watched in horror. Beside her, Analise stood, confusion and fear in her eyes. They had good reason to be afraid. All traces of the mild-mannered Mr. Rogers had vanished. The Jonathan who held him now was strong and deadly. All Reilly could think was how unfair it was that now that he’d found them, they’d be forced to watch him die.
The two horse-dogs jumped to their feet, teeth bared and barking. They couldn’t seem to make up their minds about what to attack, though.
“Call off the dogs or I’ll blow his head off,” Jonathan said calmly.
Gracie gave a sharp command and the two sat obediently, but they watched with eager eyes, just waiting for someone to make a move on their master.
Jonathan ground the gun point into his skull as Reilly scanned the room, looking for an out—or at the very least an out for Gracie and Analise. He didn’t know what would happen next, but he didn’t want them anywhere near it.
Two glowing orbs hovered on opposite ends of the room. The smaller of the two pulsed in a slow, stationary manner. The bigger one darted away and Reilly lost sight of it when it moved over his shoulder, but he could see the faces of the people around him, the horror in their expressions. He heard Jonathan suck in a deep breath and slowly let it out.
“There we go,” the man said softly, sounding like someone had just shot him full of heroine. At the same time, Brendan slumped into a chair, as if his knees had given out. All the while, the other light pulsed silently, watchful.
Chloe moved like she was in a trance, gliding to stand in front of the others, her face slack, her eyes wide with disbelief.
“Aiken, is that you?” she asked.
Gracie visibly startled at the question. Reilly felt the blood drain from his face. A part of him had suspected it, dreaded it, but until he heard Chloe say the name, he hadn’t wanted to believe it.
“Will you speak with us, Aiken? Will you let us end this curse that follows us?”
“What curse?” Analise whispered.
Jonathan—Aiken—whoever it was beneath the older man’s skin said, “I want my share.”
“Daddy, it’s time for you to move on,” Chloe said, her voice softer, weaker. Pleading. “What use have you of worldly things? Go in peace. Find solace in the afterlife.”
Jonathan said nothing, but Chloe watched him with hope in her eyes. In that instant, Reilly understood that she’d been telling the truth all along. She wanted only to lay her ghosts to rest.
“You don’t tell me what to do,” Jonathan said in a deceptively soft voice. “I tell you. Just because you’re old and shriveled doesn’t mean I won’t work you. You best remember that.”
The orb flared, as if agitated by the anger in Jonathan’s voice. Bill surged to his feet, glaring at Jonathan with clenched fists. The light grew brighter and brighter until it was nearly blinding.
The dizzying sensation of time slowing to a painful halt swept over Reilly. The walls around them seemed to draw in. The thick scent of smoke, malt, and unwashed bodies joined the heavy aroma of meat already in the air.
“Mom?” Analise said. Her voice sounded small and distant. “Do you hear that?”
Gracie nodded. They all heard it. Music and laughter, faint, like ice tinkling against glass. It came from all around them. Reilly shifted his gaze, looking through the stillness for the source of the sound. Something brushed against his legs, something else teased the sensitive skin behind his ears. The dogs growled and salivated, whining as they looked back to Gracie for a command. She remained rigid, watching Jonathan with all the fear Reilly felt. How could he protect her and Analise when he had no control?
The laughter seemed to grow louder, the smoke now a cloud over their heads. And in the sudden gloom, there was movement—people, just out of sight. Shadows danced against the walls, cast by objects he couldn’t see. He felt hands move against his shirt, like a woman’s touch trailing up his chest to his neck.
He cursed, but his voice was trapped beneath the thudding of his heart as the imagined caress became bolder and more demanding. The hands skimmed over his abdomen, down below his waist, taunting and seductive and blood-chilling. Christ, what was happening?
In the same instant, all the air was sucked from the room with such force that their clothes and hair rose to the pull. The pulsing light flared and began to move away.
“Follow it,” Jonathan said coldly. He pulled the gun from where it pressed against Reilly’s head and thrust it forward, waving it at the women. “You, you, and you,” he said, bobbing it at each one.
From the corner of his eye, Reilly could see that the revolver had to be at least a hundred years old. The metal gleamed with care and polish. Reilly thought of the cards, so well preserved and carefully stacked. His gaze moved to the spotless saloon, the dust-free pictures on the walls.
He’d been taking care of the Diablo for a long, long time.
Jonathan used Reilly’s his shoulder to brace his arm as he aimed the gun at Chloe’s face. “I want what’s mine,” he said.
Without warning, Bill lunged at Jonathan and grabbed his arm. The two men struggled. For an instant, Jonathan’s grip on Reilly’s arm loosened, and that was all Reilly needed to break free. He twisted and slammed into Jonathan, knocking him to his knees, but the other man was faster, stronger than any of them. He managed to knock Bill backward and swipe Reilly’s feet out from under him in one swift move. Before either man could recover, the gun went off with a boom! that made Analise scream. Gracie pulled her daughter into her arms as Bill crashed into the wall, blood pouring from the wound in his chest.
Before Jonathan could turn back to the others, Reilly charged, thinking to catch him off guard, but with lightning reflexes, Jonathan twisted around and took aim, looking down the long barrel into the eyes of a terrified Analise.
“I want what’s mine,” he said. “Or I take what’s yours.”
CHAPTER 32
July 1896
Diablo Springs
Two weeks had passed since Sawyer swung me into his arms and claimed me forever. Two weeks that seemed a lifetime of learning. There was no question after that where I would sleep or who I belonged to. The girls giggled among themselves and teased me about the look he’d put in my eye, but I didn’t care. I loved him, and though the words were not spoken, I felt he loved me back. What a strange world that had brought me to this place and time.
I had not forgotten about Chick during my bliss, however, though I was no closer to finding a solution to her problem. I worried on it constantly, and each time I saw a man take her up the stairs, I felt sickened. She was too much child to be a woman, too much woman to be a child. When I thought of her fear, I knew it was justified.
I’d done my best to avoid Aiken, but he had done his best to see that I didn’t. Each night he sat at my table and each night I beat him at cards, praying as I did that I would break him and force him to move on. He played on credit, still banked against his loan to Sawyer. Each time he drew on it, I made him put his mark on the ledger showing his growing use and Sawyer’s diminishing debt. I wondered if he understood numbers enough to know just how much he’d lost at the tables. There was no limit to the betting, and the miners seemed determined to lose their winnings. Many a hand I’d dealt had stakes high enough to make my heart flutter. One game at a table such as this could have reduced my father to a pauper. I had no trouble envisioning the high-stakes hand that had won Sawyer this very saloon I’d come to call home.
I was torn about one thing, though. While I wanted Aiken gone with all my heart, I knew that should he leave, he would take the women with him, and that I could not abide. I tempered my desire to influence Sawyer, if I could, to force him out. There had to be a way to free my friends of his domination.
There were no more than a hundred men living in Diablo Springs when we arrived, but each day more swarmed the small town until their white canvas tents dotted the hillside like boulders from a landslide. Each morning I awoke to the sounds of hammers and picks striking stone like the rhythmic chiming of a discordant bell. The silver was hard to find and slow to be had, but apparently, enough had been mined that others were drawn to the search. I grew accustomed, if not agreeable, to the smell of sweat and unwashed men. It might have been worse if Aiken had not insisted that they bathe before bedding any of the girls. Of all the things I loathed about Aiken, this one redeeming characteristic went far on his short list of good qualities.
Ever the entrepreneur, Aiken set up a tub in a tent beside the Diablo and charged two dollars for a bath. The men could have easily bathed for free in the warm springs, but I’d learned that in addition to being a superstitious lot, most of them were afraid of the water. It seemed that legends about the “devil springs” surpassed even those about the silver to be found in the surrounding mountains. I had heard that the springs were haunted, cursed, damned. I had yet to see evidence of it with my own eyes, and for me it would always be the wonderful place Sawyer and I escaped to in the early hours of the morning when the smell of smoke and the layers of spilled whiskey were too thick to take to bed. Though, I will admit that at times I felt the mist swirl like a phantom and I was glad not to be alone there.
Even Aiken was afraid of it. Once I’d heard Meaira try to tempt him out, and he’d refused with a vengeance that betrayed his absolute terror. Later, I’d learned that he couldn’t swim, but it still seemed to me that his fear went deeper than drowning.
Whatever the reason, few would go near the springs and so they washed themselves in Aiken’s bathing tent, using water many times over until I wondered how it could clean anyone. Athena’s job was to watch them and make sure they used soap, especially in those private areas. When the water became more mud then liquid, she would dump it and start fresh. I didn’t envy her the work, especially knowing that her chores didn’t end there or in the kitchen, because she was used by the worst of them in the bed, as well. I couldn’t imagine her exhaustion and my hear
t was sick for her, but she wouldn’t appreciate my sympathy so I didn’t offer it. When she would allow, I assisted her with the household jobs, but usually my help was rejected.
One day a man came and took our pictures. He gathered us up and arranged us like jewels in a setting. He came back later and showed us our likeness frozen forever behind glass. Sawyer bought the picture and hung it on the wall.
Each night, as the wee hours of morning came and went, business at last began to dwindle. The last man stumbled down the stairs looking as if he’d ascended from a part of heaven only he could know, and the last drunken miner was carried from the saloon and laid out on the boardwalk until he woke and found his way back to his tent.
I’d been particularly lucky of late, and even after Sawyer’s cut of my winnings, I thought I just might have enough to get Chick and Athena away from here. But where would they go? How would they live afterward? And what if Aiken chased them down? From everything I knew about him, he wouldn’t let a possession of his go so easily, and that’s what the girls were—his possessions.
All this I thought of as the night wound down and Sawyer locked the door behind the last customer. As usual, he wiped his bar with the pride of ownership and then went to the storage room where he kept his money chest. Aiken watched him go with an expression I didn’t like.
Bad Boys of the Night: Eight Sizzling Paranormal Romances: Paranormal Romance Boxed Set Page 192