by Jo Goodman
He set her on her feet on a soft bed of fallen needles. Her arms were still looped around his neck. He started to say her name again, this time in question, but she shook her head slightly and stood on tiptoe. Her mouth touched his, answering what he had only asked with his eyes.
The kiss was sweet and lingering. Maggie's lips moved over his. Her tongue traced the line of his upper lip, not seeking entry, merely tasting. She felt his hands at the small of her back, holding her to him, and the way he held her felt like security, not capture.
She kissed the underside of his jaw. His mouth slid over her temple and the fragrance of her hair teased him again. Maggie leaned against him more heavily when her knees couldn't seem to support her. He lowered her to the ground as the kiss between them deepened. They knelt at first, too greedy and demanding to break the contact. Connor's fingers twisted the buttons on Maggie's overblouse and slipped it over her shoulders. Her breasts pressed against the thin material of her camisole.
Maggie broke the kiss and pulled back slightly. She drew in a shaky breath as she looked down at herself. Her uncertain glance was finally raised in Connor's direction. He was staring at the shadowed curve of her breasts, and Maggie raised her arms to cover herself. He stopped her, circling her wrists lightly with his fingers.
"No," he said. "You're beautiful. I wish it were the middle of the afternoon."
Maggie ducked her head, embarrassed. She watched his hands as they released her wrists and moved to the level of her camisole. His fingers slid along the edge of the material, caressing the high arc of her breasts. He twisted a button and the material parted. He did it again. And again. Her breasts filled his hands. His thumbs drew slowly across her nipples. He heard her tiny gasp.
"Did I hurt you?" he asked.
Not looking at him, she shook her head.
"Maggie?"
"They're tender," she whispered.
His touch was even lighter this time. The tip of her breasts stiffened beneath his thumbs, and Maggie's small shudder was one of aching, not pain. Connor leaned toward her. He bent his head and touched his mouth to her nipple. Maggie's fingers threaded in his hair, supporting him even as she held on as she was lowered the rest of the way to the ground. The pine needles at her back were an odd sensation, soft yet abrasive, the very same sensation that Connor's mouth was causing as it moved over her breast.
His lips slid in the valley between her breasts. Her racing heart pulsed against his mouth. He raised his head and stretched out beside her, curving one arm under Maggie's neck to cradle her. He looked at her for a long moment, his eyes searching her shadowed face, listening to the sounds of her tremulous breathing. He lowered his mouth over hers. Her lips parted.
Connor's tongue pushed against hers, deepening the kiss as a surge of carnal hunger swept them both. His lips pressed. Hers responded. They shared the same breath.
His lips touched the corner of her mouth, her cheek, the sensitive skin just behind her earlobe. He was drawn again and again back to her mouth, to lips that were sweet and yielding, to a response that was eager and searching. One kiss was not enough. Each kiss demanded another.
Connor's mouth touched her closed eyes. "Look at me, Maggie," he said hoarsely.
She opened her eyes slowly, shyly. His breath was warm on her face. One of his legs was lying over hers and his free hand twisted in her hair.
"You're not afraid?" he asked. He didn't give her time to answer. "I don't want you to be afraid."
"I'm not afraid," she said on a mere thread of sound. She reached up to touch his face. She liked the clean, solid lines of his jaw in the curve of her palm. "I want you to know about the first time," she said. "There was no force."
He started to open his mouth to speak, but she stopped him by placing her index finger across his lips. "I was afraid then," she said quietly. "Waking up... realizing what I was doing with you... how much I wanted it... those feelings frightened me... but then..." It was difficult to look at him. "You didn't force me."
"You remember?"
She said the next words against his mouth. "I remember that much." Then she kissed him hungrily.
Their mouths fused with the intense pressure of their need. This time it was Maggie who was working the buttons. She fumbled with the ones on Connor's vest and shirt and pushed them both off his shoulders. He worked them down his arms and flung them to one side. Maggie caught the waistband of his jeans as he turned and fumbled with the buttons of his fly. She managed three before he placed his hands over hers, stopping her.
"I want to enjoy this," he said against her mouth. "If you touch me now I'll..." He didn't have to finish. In spite of her inexperience, Maggie understood. Her hands slid slowly up his chest to his shoulders, rubbing him with the heels of her hands. "How do you know so much?" he asked, nudging her nose with his.
"I read."
He didn't ask her what kind of books, but he bet they were ones she didn't read where just anyone could catch her. Connor groaned softly as her hands slid between them again and his skin retracted at her touch. Her mouth followed the path of her hands. The damp edge of her tongue made a line down his throat, across his collar bone. Her teeth raised his nipples to hard nubs.
They were on their sides again, Maggie's belly pressing against his hard abdomen. One of her legs was raised over his as their mouths worked. The baby kicked hard enough for Connor to feel it. He tore his mouth away from Maggie's. "My God," he whispered hoarsely, awed and a little frightened. She drew his face back to hers. "It's all right."
"What if I—"
"You won't."
He kissed her again, this time turning her so she straddled him. Her breasts spilled toward him. His hands slipped under her skirt, along her calves to her hips. He pulled at her drawers and she helped him so that while her skirt billowed around her modestly it was her naked thighs that touched him. He spread his hands over her hard belly. She sighed as he rubbed her stretched and sensitive skin, desiring in that moment nothing more than to curl against him contentedly. Then his hand slipped beneath her parted thighs, and he touched her in another manner, manipulating the delicate bud at the source of her moist heat. She sucked in her breath as pleasure seemed to sear her senses. The heel of his hand pressed against her. Deliriously responsive to his touch, she rubbed and rode. She leaned forward as his finger probed and penetrated. First one, then another. Maggie closed her eyes, surrendering to sensation.
Her hair slipped forward over her shoulders. The auburn curtain surrounded his face. She was hot against him, moving, shuddering. Her breath came in short gasps as she sipped the night air. Then suddenly she rose up, dislodging his hand, and when he tried to hold her she avoided his grasp.
"I want more than this," she whispered, her voice husky. Her hands slipped to his jeans again, this time reaching under the material.
"No," he said.
She ignored him, releasing his cock.
"Maggie."
"Let me." She had touched him this way before, holding him in her hand, stroking. He had made a sound at the back of his throat, the way he was doing now. "Come into me," she said. "Just like before."
Connor was no match against her siren's call. She was innocence unraveled, and in her feminine heart she was all desiring. His hands curved over her hips, lifting her. She guided him into her slowly, drawing out his entrance until he jerked his hips and made her take all of him.
She cried out, a breathy little sound that Connor didn't mistake for pain. His hands moved to her tender breasts, caressing them as she began to move against him. She didn't close her eyes this time, watching his hands instead as they slid across her skin, wishing, as he did, that more moonlight filtered between the overhanging boughs. The shadow of his movements and the calloused, slightly abrasive touch of his fingertips caused ripples of heat to spread through her.
Maggie felt the spiral of mounting pleasure. Connor's hands slid to her hips again as his own climax neared, his fingers pressing against her skin. She leaned for
ward, her breath coming in short gasps again. He guided her, watching, gauging the rise and intensity of her need, until he felt himself give way and could only react selfishly, jerking against her as pleasure spilled out of him, along with his seed.
A moment later, when he touched her intimately, Maggie slipped over the edge, climaxing hard as joy seemed to shatter her. She held onto him, said his name in a ragged, breathy sigh, and then collapsed against him. He turned her so they could stretch out comfortably on the bed of pine needles, the curve of her buttocks cradled against his groin.
He kissed her neck, nuzzled her. Maggie pulled at the open throat of her camisole, trying to cover her breasts. "No," he said. "Leave it." One of his hands cupped the underside of her breast.
"But I have to get back to the cabin." Her protest wasn't said with much conviction. She added rather helplessly, "Dancer's tea."
"There's time," he said. "We've been gone this long. He'll understand."
"He'll know?" she asked.
Connor smiled. Their clothes were scattered to kingdom come; what they still wore was in disarray. Maggie's lips were swollen from his kisses, her hair sprinkled with pine needles, and he could still feel the heat from her flushed body. "I think he'll know," he said. "Are you sorry?"
"Not sorry," she said. "A little embarrassed." Now that the haze of desire was fading, Maggie could admit to herself that her embarrassment ran deep. "It was like this the first time we were together, wasn't it?" Her question wasn't really a question because she felt the answer in her bones, across the expanse of her skin, as if memory had seeped to a level below her consciousness. Connor's nearness, their posture, was familiar to her. His hand at her breast was not alarming, but comforting.
"Very much like this," he said, thinking of the intense desire that had existed between them.
"If I had been a whore," she said quietly, cautiously, "would you have come to see me again?"
He hesitated. The question was much more complicated than she thought and required something more than a simple yes or no. His hesitation cost him a chance to reply.
"I see," she said, starting to rise.
"You're assuming the answer's no," he said. He reached for her but she eluded his grasp. He sat up, righting the fly of his jeans as Maggie drew her camisole together and began to look around for her over-blouse.
"Yes, I'm assuming that. Are you telling me I'm wrong?"
"No."
"Well then?" She stood and brushed off her skirt. The overblouse was caught in one of the boughs and she yanked it free.
"You're offended," he said.
That gave Maggie pause. She held the blouse in front of her. Reason asserted itself slowly. She sighed and smiled faintly, derisively, mocking herself. "I'm sorry. It was a stupid question. I shouldn't have asked."
Connor got to his feet and picked up his shirt and vest. "I wouldn't have returned because I would have been afraid," he told her. He wasn't looking at her, but he felt her stillness. "I was angry that night... restless..." He remembered his winnings at the poker table. "And full of selfish pride. What I wanted wasn't meant to be personal. And I wouldn't have wanted it to be. I would have stayed away for the rest of my time in New York."
She opened her mouth to say something, but he turned then and looked at her. A shaft of moonlight touched his face and his eyes were sharp, the blackness intense.
"And I would have spent the rest of my life thinking about you." Ignoring her sharp intake of breath, he shrugged into his shirt, tucking in the tails, then slipped into his vest. "That's what I would have done if you'd been a whore," he said. His voice was harsh as he began to shrug off his vulnerability. "I sure as hell wouldn't have married you."
Maggie flinched a little at his tone. "You sound as though you still regret it."
This time his hesitation was purposeful, and he didn't bother explaining it, letting her think what she would. "Let's go," he said.
She didn't move. "You got what you wanted out of this marriage," she reminded him.
"Didn't you?" he asked. "You got your escort west. You've learned what Dancer could teach you. Or was there something else you wanted that I don't know about?"
"Yes," she said, her chin rising slightly. "But I got that, too." She began to walk past him, but he stepped in front of her, not touching her, just blocking her path. "I wanted a name for my baby." This time when she moved around him, he didn't try to stop her.
Connor followed Maggie to the cabin but at a slower pace. By the time he arrived she was serving Dancer the white willow tea. The prospector was pale, sweat beaded on the unscarred portion of his face. Maggie's own face was devoid of expression as she pointed to the washbasin. She made her wishes known with a brief gesture. Connor crossed the cabin and wet a cloth, returning to the bed to give it to her.
"He's fevered," she said.
"Ain't nothin'," Dancer said as she wiped his brow. "It's got to be expected with a break like mine."
"I shouldn't have left you," she said. "It won't happen again."
"Now, girl, don't go sayin' things like that."
"I mean it, Dancer. I'm not leaving you." She removed the empty mug from his hands and placed it on the table. When Dancer was comfortable again, she began to bathe his face.
Connor brought the washbasin to her, then went to the loft and began arranging the bedclothes. He called down to Dancer. "Do you have extra blankets up here? Maggie steals the covers."
"In the trunk," Dancer said, grinning lopsidedly at Maggie.
"Just throw them down here," she said, glancing toward the loft. "I'll sleep on the floor."
Connor peered over the edge. "Like hell," he said pleasantly and returned to his work. Opening the trunk, he found a stack of blankets. He pulled out two and snapped them over the mattress. Dancer's bed was nothing more than a straw-filled tick spread out over the floor, but Connor smoothed it out, tucked in the blankets, and plumped the goose feather pillows. It was when he started to shut the trunk lid that an envelope caught his eye.
He recognized it immediately. It was addressed to Maggie and her name was scrawled in his handwriting. He didn't have to open it to know what it contained. Nearly two months ago he'd sent Buck to Dancer's to deliver the divorce documents for Maggie's signature. He thought the papers had gone on to Denver by now.
He opened the envelope and pulled out the papers. There was only one signature on any of them: his. He slipped the documents back inside and put the folded envelope in his rear pocket. It was something they'd have to discuss, but he doubted she was any more prepared to talk about it now than he.
Connor leaned over the loft again. He saw that Dancer was sleeping and Maggie had moved to the broken rocker. "Turn back the lamps, Maggie. It's time to come to bed. I want to get to the Double H before noon tomorrow."
"I'm not going to stop you," she said.
"No, but Dancer's going to hold us up a little."
"Us?"
He nodded. "You and me. We're leaving in the morning." He made a circling motion with his finger. "All three of us. And if you want to discuss it, you'll do it up here. I'm going to bed."
Chapter 12
Connor held the ladder steady as Maggie climbed to the loft. He helped her over the edge. "You managed that rather gracefully," he said.
"Don't lie. I'm as big as a cow and twice as clumsy." She crawled onto the mattress, dragging her nightshift with her. "I can't get up and down that ladder all night long," she told him. "You'll have to see to Dancer when he needs more of the tea."
"Precisely what I had in mind. You need your rest." He fiddled with the loft's single oil lamp, adjusting the wick until there was only a suggestion of a flame. Darkness gave Maggie the privacy she craved. "Do you want help with your buttons?" he asked.
"No," she said shortly. "You undressed me once tonight. That was enough."
"You'll understand if I think otherwise."
She didn't understand. "I thought you didn't want anything else to do with me," she
said stiffly.
"I never said that."
Maggie started to argue but an abrupt, wide yawn took the wind out of her sails.
"Bedtime," Connor said, pulling off his shirt. He turned back the lamp the rest of the way and crawled onto the mattress. The straw crackled. Maggie finished putting on her nightshift and followed him. She turned on her side, drawing her legs upward in a position that was comfortable for her in her pregnant state. When Connor curled against her, fitting his contours to hers, she didn't push him away. His chest and legs were actually a welcome support against her back and thighs.
"The tea has already been separated into doses," she told him, stifling another yawn. "You can give it to Dancer cold every four hours. It's on the table beside him."
"I'll take care of it."
"Don't break your leg going up and down the ladder."
He chuckled, his breath ruffling her hair. "You sure are bossy." He made the point with a certain amount of affection.
"I'm not going anywhere with you in the morning."
This time he didn't respond. He slipped his arm around her and closed his eyes. He felt her stiffen, then relax. In minutes they were both racing toward pleasant dreams.
* * *
By noon the following day Maggie found herself on a horse headed in the direction of the Double H. She hardly knew how it had come to pass. The best explanation she could have offered was that Connor Holiday simply didn't take no for an answer. Throughout the morning he had chosen to ignore her rather than discuss it. He simply began packing supplies and clothing on Dancer's mule and their mounts. Since they had no wagon for Dancer, he built a travois and hitched it to the prospector's horse. Dancer, confined to the bed, kept asking Maggie to fetch his shotgun so he could kill the bastard. She noticed Connor had the good sense to watch her out of the corner of his eye as if she could be tempted to do it. There were moments when she thought it would have served him right.