by Amelia Autin
“God, Rennie. Don’t.” A tremor shook him. He kissed her eyes closed, catching her tears with his tongue. Though it cost him every ounce of willpower he had, he started to withdraw.
“No!” She was fierce in her denial. She tightened her slender thighs around his hips, holding him in place. “Please, Gideon. Don’t stop.” He hesitated, and she reached down between their bodies to touch him where they were joined.
The last shreds of his control vanished into oblivion. A groan rumbled out of him and the muscles in his buttocks flexed, completing his possession of her in one stroke. She cried out, a small sound that escaped despite her best efforts to hold it back. He heard it, a whiplash against his conscience, and he flinched.
But she felt so good, so tight and wet and soft. It had been so long he’d almost forgotten how good a woman’s body felt as it closed around him, had almost forgotten the waves of pleasure generated from being held within those warm depths. He almost came in that moment, buried so deep in Rennie that he touched her womb. Only that small cry of pain held him back. He had to make it good for her. He had to.
So instead of beginning the driving rhythm his body craved, he rolled over on his back, bringing her with him. His move was so unexpected that she sat up, straddling his hips. Exactly what he wanted. Freed of the need to support his weight, his hands cupped her breasts, flicking his thumbs over her nipples. Then his fingers trailed down and found that tiny button of flesh, and he caressed it until he felt her involuntary response.
The pain receded as her body began to accept his invasion. Rennie felt new ripples of lightning shiver through her at his touch. She began to rock against him, compelled by a need that had swiftly rebuilt to explosive proportions. He helped, lifting her partway off him, then sliding her back down over him as they found their tempo.
Her heart hammered inside her breast and her breath came in pants. Her hair clung in wisps around her damp face. She gazed down at Gideon, the savage expression on his face matching the wildness inside her. The pace quickened as she reached for something just out of her grasp, and she sobbed, wanting this to be over, yet never wanting it to end.
The crest caught her unprepared. It tore through her, endless spasms of such violent pleasure that she collapsed on his chest, weeping and crying out his name over and over.
Her climax triggered his. He made a guttural sound and rolled them over once more, pulling up her legs and driving into her soft depths, riding her hard. She tightened her legs around him and arched to meet his thrusts as he came, hot jets that filled her and emptied him.
He sagged against her, all strength gone. Just breathing seemed almost too much effort, and his chest heaved as he tried to drag in enough air. Rennie made a tiny sound, and he realized he must be crushing her. His arms trembled as he attempted to free her.
“No.” She pulled at his hips, anchoring him where he was.
“But I’m too heavy for you.”
She rubbed her cheek against his chest. “No,” she whispered. “Please stay.”
He compromised by moving to one side and shifting most of his weight, but remaining inside her. She made a contented sound and snuggled as close to him as possible, hooking one leg over his to retain the connection. When their breathing eventually slowed and their heartbeats returned to normal, she murmured something he didn’t catch. He brushed his lips against her forehead.
“You okay?”
“Um-hmm.” She took a deep breath and let it out slowly, then smiled. “Are you?”
“Yeah.” Satisfaction, rich and dark, colored his voice. “Oh, yeah.” His arms tightened around her.
Though the silence between them was warm with the echoes of the passion they’d just shared, the room became chilly as their bodies cooled. When she shivered and huddled closer to his warmth, he gently disengaged their bodies, then reached down and dragged the covers over them.
Sleep beckoned. Gideon dozed off and Rennie watched him, savoring these quiet moments in his arms. She kissed him, a butterfly kiss that didn’t disturb his slumber.
No woman could have had a better lover, she thought. Her only regret was that he hadn’t been the first. But in a way he had been. He’d been the first man to show her what her body was capable of experiencing, the first to tap the depths of passion she’d never even suspected she possessed. She’d never even imagined some of the things he’d done. Even the pain of their joining had been welcome because of him. Feeling him so intimately, seeing the pleasure he derived from her body, had fueled her desire to the point where nothing else mattered but loving him.
Remembering brought a blush to her cheeks, and her body flushed with heat. Of their own volition her hands stroked his chest, tangling in the soft covering of hair, then sliding downward over the incredibly taut muscles of his stomach and abdomen. She found what she sought, and her fingers closed over him.
“You’re gonna be in trouble if you don’t stop.” The deep, raspy sound startled her, but she recovered quickly.
“Oh?” Her wide-eyed look of innocence was belied by the way her hands continued to caress him.
“Full of sass, aren’t you. What happened to that shy woman who came to my room?”
“She went for coffee. I’m taking her place.” His deep chuckle turned into a groan of pleasure as she reached farther and cupped him. “Do you want me to stop?”
His “no!” was emphatic enough to warm any woman’s heart. He turned fully onto his back, pulling her on top of him, and spread his legs. Then his hands caught hers and taught them a better rhythm. Soon they were both aroused, hearts pumping in irregular fashion. Mouths met, tongues entwined, and arms and legs meshed inextricably.
The shrill of the telephone shocked them into immobility. They stared at each other for endless seconds, panting slightly, while the phone continued to ring. Then Gideon fumbled for the receiver.
“Yeah?”
The change that came over him was almost frightening. He jackknifed into a sitting position, instantly alert. He asked only two questions, “How long?” and “Where have you looked?” He listened intently to the answers he received, and his sudden emotional retreat from her as the caller spoke was almost a tangible thing. Then he said, “We’ll be home as soon as possible,” and hung up.
He sat on the edge of the bed for a moment, his shoulders hunched in a way she’d never seen. Then he stood up, grabbed his jeans from the floor and began pulling them on. He avoided her gaze, or so it seemed to her.
“Gideon? What is it?”
He tugged his shirt on and buttoned it hastily, then tucked it in and zipped his jeans. “How long will it take you to pack? We’ve got to get back to Carter’s Junction right away.”
He hauled his suitcase from the corner and flipped it open, throwing his things in haphazardly. She scrambled from the bed, dragging the sheet with her.
“What’s happened? What’s wrong?”
He picked up one boot and stared at it for a second, then dropped it and looked at her. His expression held equal parts anger and pain. “It’s Nicki. She’s run away.”
Chapter 9
Nicki rubbed the back of her hand across her eyes. Darkness surrounded her like a blanket, and she was tired, cold and scared. But the tears still wouldn’t fall, even though she desperately wanted to cry, needed to cry. And the ache in her chest wouldn’t go away, either. The hurt inside was so big it almost choked her.
Daddy wasn’t coming back. Nobody knew it yet, except her. And she knew why, too. It was because of her, because of what she’d done.
She straightened in the saddle and nudged her heels into Cheyenne’s sides. The horse tossed his head, balking at the trail ahead of them. Nicki dug her heels in harder. She didn’t care if Cheyenne didn’t want to take her where she wanted to go. He had to. He just had to.
Cheyenne snorted his disapproval, but the third time she kicked him he finally gave in and started slowly upward.
* * *
It wasn’t even midnight when Renn
ie and Gideon checked out of the motel. So much had happened tonight that Rennie thought somehow it should be later.
The drive back to Carter’s Junction took much less time than the trip out. She said nothing when Gideon pressed the accelerator to the floor and told her curtly to watch for wildlife on the road. And when he took the dark mountain curves at terrifying speeds, she gripped her hands in her lap, trusting in God, Gideon and her little sports car to get them safely home.
The dark, brooding silence of the stranger beside her tore at her heart. She sensed the unspoken self-recriminations weighing heavy on his conscience. She ached to comfort him, but he’d withdrawn from her so completely she didn’t know how to bridge the chasm. Still, she had to try.
“It’s not your fault,” she said softly.
“Then whose fault is it?” His tone was bitter. “I broke my promise. I told my children we’d be home tonight. I promised them. I’ve never broken a promise to them.”
“But that doesn’t mean—”
His anger at himself splashed over onto her. “A promise may not mean much to you, but it’s damned important to me!”
Stung, Rennie fired back, “Promises are important to me, too!”
He ignored her as if she hadn’t spoken. “But I was so caught up in having a good time, I forgot my promise to my kids. Damn it, I didn’t even get a chance to talk with them when I called Emily this morning!”
“Why not?”
“They were getting dressed for church. Emily said they were already running late, so I told her I’d call them after dinner to explain why I wouldn’t be home till tomorrow.” He threw an accusing look in her direction that seared her even in the darkness. “Then you came to my room.”
“So it’s my fault?”
When she put it into words he realized how unfair it was to blame her, but his guilty conscience made him lash out. “You’ve had me so hot this entire weekend that when you finally said yes, I forgot everything else.”
“I never meant—”
“Hell, it doesn’t matter what you meant.” He laughed harshly as he downshifted, slowing slightly to round a blind curve. “It doesn’t change what happened.”
“But it wasn’t like that!”
“Maybe. Maybe not. All I know is what I see.” He increased pressure on the accelerator and the car responded with a spurt of speed. Something more than his guilt over Nicki drove him to add, “Didn’t take you long, though, did it? For someone who claimed to have almost no sexual experience, you certainly learned fast. Makes a man wonder.”
“Don’t. Please don’t.”
Pain ripped through his gut when he heard the tears in her voice, and he despised himself for putting them there. He was a bastard for taking this out on her, but damn it, couldn’t she see that he didn’t mean it? And he didn’t have time right now to apologize.
Dark silence pulsed around them. When they reached the bottom of the mountain, Gideon turned onto the highway and unleashed all the power Rennie’s car was justly famous for. The speedometer needle leapt upward, and Rennie remembered with a pang how he’d grinned like a kid—was it only the day before yesterday?—and said he’d bet her car could do one-seventy on the open road. He’d sounded so carefree that morning, almost happy. Now he had the opportunity to find out if he’d win his bet, but she knew he wouldn’t even remember.
He was happy that day. We were happy. But none of it means a thing unless Nicki’s all right. It will destroy him if anything happens to her.
Rennie couldn’t let her thoughts continue in that vein. The consequences were too devastating to think about. Abruptly she asked, “Would you tell me what Emily said on the phone?”
At first she thought he wasn’t going to answer, but then he said brusquely, “She said Nicki’s been brooding all weekend, hanging around the house, not even wanting to go out riding, which she usually loves. But Emily wasn’t really worried about it until tonight, when I didn’t call. She said Nicki scarcely ate any dinner, then hovered over the phone till way past her bedtime. Emily said when she finally made Nicki go to bed, Nicki looked stricken. That was the word she used. Stricken. An hour later, when Emily checked on the kids, Nicki was gone.”
“Oh, Gideon, I’m so sorry.” She wanted to touch him, to comfort him somehow, but she knew her touch wouldn’t be welcome now. “Where do you think she might have gone?”
His breath expelled in a rush and he shook his head. “No idea. Emily’s already started the search, but since Nicki’s horse is also missing, there’s no telling how far she may have gotten. We have to assume she could be anywhere. And tracking at night is chancy at best.”
“So what are you going to do?”
“Damned if I know. But I’ve got to do something. I can’t just wait around and hope she comes home.” He glanced at her. “She’s only nine, Rennie.” His words came out husky with pain and urgency. “It’s killing me to think of her all alone out there in the dark. She might be lost, or hurt, or just cold and frightened. Not knowing is the worst of it.” His voice dropped to a whisper. “Not knowing...”
“We’ll find her. I know we will.”
He continued as if he hadn’t even heard her. “I can’t lose her, too. Not Nicki, God, not my baby. Watch over her, Jo. Don’t let anything happen to her.”
Rennie was certain Gideon didn’t even realize what he was saying. It was so obviously second nature for him to speak his beloved first wife’s name in times of stress. She averted her face from his and stared out at the star-studded midnight sky.
Well, you knew from the first that he loved Johanna, she reminded herself. But that didn’t stop you from marrying him. That didn’t stop you from trying to make things up to him. So you can’t let this get to you. You can’t let yourself feel rejected.
But it still hurt. Especially after the beauty of their lovemaking only a few hours ago. She’d felt so close to him, sharing her body with him the way she wanted to share the growing emotions in her heart.
Lovemaking on your part, maybe. But just sex for Gideon. Good sex, passionate sex, but sex all the same. His heart still belongs to Johanna. And why do you care, anyway? It’s not as if you love him. So why does it hurt so much?
But she shied away from answering her own question, and gave herself a mental shake. She shouldn’t be thinking about herself right now. She should be trying to figure out where a confused nine-year-old girl would go to nurse her pain and sense of betrayal.
Rennie was still puzzling over that thought when Gideon pulled her car up in front of the Holden’s sprawling ranch house.
It seemed as if every light in the house, the bunkhouse and the barns was on, and the stableyard bustled with activity. Half a dozen men on horseback with lanterns congregated around an older man standing in the bed of a pickup truck, and Rennie recognized Jim Holden. He was shouting out instructions, but when Gideon unfolded himself from the driver’s seat of the sports car, Jim jumped down and hurried over.
“You made good time.”
“Have you found her?”
Jim darted a glance at Rennie, who had come to stand at Gideon’s side. He grimaced, then looked back at Gideon. “No, and it doesn’t look good,” he said gruffly. “We been searchin’ everywhere, but nobody’s found Nicki. Just haven’t had much luck trackin’.”
Gideon didn’t flinch, but Rennie almost felt his muscles clench against the pain and fear she knew must be tearing him apart.
Jim continued. “Already got two search parties out right now, and the third’s just formin’ up.” His grizzled head gestured at the group behind him.
“Got a horse for me?” Rennie scarcely recognized the harsh voice as Gideon’s.
Jim nodded. “Take mine. She’s in the barn, saddled up and ready to go. I’ll get another and join you soon as I can.”
“Thanks.”
“Least I could do. I’m real sorry about this. Emily and I shoulda seen it comin’.”
Gideon clasped the older man’s shoulder and squee
zed it. “Not your fault, Jim. Mine. Only mine.”
Jim shook his head in sympathy, then headed for the barn without a word. Gideon turned and almost bumped into Rennie. By his startled look he’d obviously not even known she was there.
“Rennie, I...”
“I’ll be okay. You go do what you have to do.” He looked at her strangely, almost beseechingly, and without even thinking about it she slid her arms around her husband’s waist and held him tight. After a second his arms closed around her. “She’ll be fine,” Rennie reassured him. “I know she will. You’ll find her. You’ll see.”
They remained like that for only a moment before Gideon tore himself away. Rennie stood where she was and watched him mount the horse Jim brought out of the barn, then ride away with the other men.
“Oh, God, let me be right. Let Nicki be okay,” she whispered to the night.
A movement at the corner of her eye made her swing around. Emily stood a few feet away, the bemused expression on her face changing to wonderment.
“You care about him.”
Rennie didn’t even try to prevaricate. “Yes,” she said softly, simply. “I do. Very much.”
“You hurt for him.”
“Yes.”
“You’d take his pain if you could.”
“Yes,” Rennie answered for the third time.
“I once felt like that.” Emily looked suddenly older and very, very tired.
“Not...not about Gideon?”
“Oh, no.” Emily’s laugh was the saddest thing Rennie had ever heard. “Not Gideon. Someone else. A long, long time ago. A lifetime ago.” She stared past Rennie into the darkness as if seeing something only she could see.
“Emily...”
The other woman blinked, then shook her head as if shaking off memories too painful to bear. She looked at Rennie again, this time with remorse. “I’m sorry I had to bring you back like this, sorry I didn’t take better care of Nicki.”