He drew back a bit more, studying her, his gaze shifting to her uncomfortably warm cheeks. The knowing gleam in his eyes made her feel embarrassed. And instantly conscious of her nakedness. In the wake of that, she felt undignified, remembering how she had writhed and moaned beneath his hands. She could tell by the look in his eyes that he was remembering, too.
The smile in his eyes spread to his mouth. He twisted his shoulders, groping behind him. An instant later, he held up his shirt and spread it over her. Grateful for the shield, Amy hugged the black cloth close, awash in uncertainty. Her first inclination was to scramble for her clothes, but those were in the bedroom and she’d have to walk miles to retrieve them. Not only that, but it felt wrong to scurry away, as if nothing important had occurred. Yet that was what she yearned to do.
“I’m—I’m afraid I’m not very good at this,” she whispered.
“If you were, I’d be disappointed. Don’t you know that a man likes to think he’s the first? That his woman is his and only his?”
Amy’s stomach clenched. “Swift, you know that—”
“I’ll tell you what I know,” he whispered. “You’re as sweet and pure and precious as any woman who ever lived. No man’s ever kissed you like this.” He bent his head to feather a light kiss across her mouth. “Or touched you like I have. Or seen your body like I have. Or made love to you. You’re mine and only mine, Amy. That’s what I know.”
“Oh, Swift . . .” The shirt shifted, and she tugged it back into place.
He laughed softly. “I’d offer to go get your clothes, but I like you this way.”
Amy shot a nervous glance toward the dark hallway, which seemed horribly distant. Swift sat up, apparently at ease with his nudity. With a splendid show of rippling muscle, he leaned forward, reaching for his pants. She studied the play of tendon in his back as he moved, fascinated by the way his burnished flesh bulged into steely knots, then relaxed. He rose, affording her a full view of tendon-roped buttocks and corded thighs as he pulled his pants on. The jangle of his belt buckle sounded, the band of leather snapping taut around his lean hips. He retrieved his socks and boots, then sat beside her to put them on.
When finished, he turned his dark head to regard her, his twinkling gaze shifting to the shirt she clutched to her breasts. “Can I talk you out of a smoke?” he asked.
Amy swallowed, horrified at the thought of handing his shirt over, which would leave her naked. He fell back on an elbow and skimmed his hand over the denim, his fingers searching for the pocket that held his tobacco pouch. The pocket in question lay over her right breast, outside in. He dived his hand under the shirt collar, his palm rasping down her chest, then fumbling about as he tried to wrest his tobacco pouch free. The unintentional touches on her breast sent her senses spinning.
Suddenly his hand stilled. His gaze met hers. His white teeth flashed in a rakish grin. Abandoning his quest inside the shirt pocket, he curled his warm fingers around her. “To hell with a smoke,” he whispered huskily.
With that, he kissed her. And within seconds Amy found herself losing her grip on the shield of denim, losing her grip on everything. As her senses reeled under his expert coaxing, she dimly recorded the whimpering sounds she was making and realized, vaguely, that Swift had a power over her that she had never allowed anyone else, an enslaving, controlling power that she was helpless to resist, didn’t want to resist. She responded to every touch of his hands, every unvoiced command, moaning because surrender would bring ecstasy, ecstasy rapture, and rapture mindlessness. His hands gliding over her body reduced her to a quivering, thoughtless, throbbing puddle of longing, and she eddied dizzily under his light caresses, writhing, arching upward, wanting his fingertips to set her afire as they had earlier.
In a haze of passion, she felt the featherlight gentleness leave him, replaced by a feverish, harsh urgency. The touch of his hands became relentless, his fingers pressing deep into her flesh, staking claim. When he clamped a palm over the now throbbing apex of her thighs, grinding the heel of his hand against her, jolts of sheer sensation ripped through her. His breathing echoed in her head, ragged and quick, the sound of a man burning with need.
When he dragged her hips beneath him, Amy realized he meant to take her quickly. No ecstasy; no mindlessness. For an instant, fear lashed her. He jerked open his belt buckle, unfastened his pants. She felt the steely length of his manhood, thrusting and hot against her thigh, seeking entry. Before she could register that completely, he found her and drove into her, hard. She gasped, her belly convulsing, her insides twisting and clasping. His arms encircled her, snapping taut, almost hurting in their possession of her.
He withdrew and thrust forward, unleashing the power in his body, the impact jarring through her, and him, his invasion deep and fierce. Then, with no preamble, he set a pace, the rhythm furious this time and merciless. She tensed, expecting pain. Instead the rhythm consumed her. She responded instinctively, tucking her legs around his thighs and arching to meet him, increasing the impact, glorying in the slamming bursts of fire that erupted through her, setting her middle aflame, turning it molten.
He was power and might, she the vanquished. Pride and dignity eluded her. She surrendered to the force, rose to absorb it, whimpering as his need became her own, a burning, insatiable need that drove her upward, onward, turning white hot, blinding her. Just as she peaked, Swift froze above her, his face twisting, his shoulders shuddering, his arms in spasms. Then she felt the fire in him erupt into her, a wave of breathtaking heat that rushed and broke, intensifying hers.
With a groan he resumed the pace, slowly at first, his face a sheen of satisfaction, his gaze holding hers as he increased tempo. In the back of her mind, Amy realized he meant to watch her as he thrust her over the edge, but she had come too far to resist, her body more his now than hers. A smile touched his mouth. She saw it, registered it, and then lost contact with reality as his thrusts pushed her past caring.
She heard him whispering to her, urging her on. With a cry she clutched his shoulders, clinging, gasping for breath, her hips arching up to meet him as the climax came. Like Swift, she fell victim to shuddering, convulsive spasms.
When she lay quivering and spent beneath him, he gathered her close, his hot mouth pressing kisses to her breasts, her throat, her face. Exhausted, Amy turned into his embrace, limp and boneless. He held her, stroking a hand from her bottom to her shoulders until sleep stole over her, a deep, mindless, dreamless sleep, her body enveloped by the warmth of him.
Amy woke up to find herself surrounded by darkness. She recognized the softness of her down mattress beneath her. Something warm and damp skimmed her legs. She blinked and stiffened, straining to see.
“Swift?”
He laughed low in his chest. “Who do you think?”
“Wh-what are you doing?” she squeaked, frustrated by the blackness and the familiarity of his hands on her person.
The cloth skimmed up her thigh. “I’m bathing you. I promised, remember? Not a trace of apple when I finished.”
She heard a wet plop as he discarded the rag. The covers snapped as he brought them fluttering down over her. His weight sank onto the mattress beside her. The next instant his arm came around her, the sleeve of his shirt abrasive on her waist, his palm leathery on her back.
“I have to leave, golden one. In a couple more hours it’ll be dawn, and if anyone sees me sneaking out of here, your reputation will be shot to hell.”
Amy could feel his breath on her cheek, the heat of him, but all she could make out of him visually was a blackness before her that was blacker than the night. She made fists in his shirt, suddenly and inexplicably frightened. Once he left, reality might come back between them. She wanted to hold this night close, keep it forever.
“I—I don’t want you to go. We’re married now, aren’t we? Why must you leave?”
His lips grazed hers. “Amy, love, Comanche law doesn’t mean squat to the people here. If I stay before we’re married their way, they’ll look at you as a fallen woman.” There was a smile in his voice. “I think we need to find a priest—quick.”
“He won’t come back here for weeks!”
His tongue touched hers, and he groaned. “Weeks?”
“Weeks,” she repeated, hopelessness filling her. “I don’t want to wait for weeks. Do you? I want you to stay with me now. A Comanche marriage is good enough. It’s everything.”
The panic in her voice was unmistakable. Swift drew back to study her shadowed face. “Amy, love, what’s wrong?”
“I—I just don’t want you to go. I have this horrid feeling that once you do, tonight won’t ever have happened.”
He ran a hand into her hair. Though he had experienced the same feelings himself, Swift knew by the sound of her voice that he hadn’t felt her panic. “Honey, that’s crazy.”
“I don’t care. It’s how I feel. If you leave, something might happen. You might never come back.”
“I’ll be back,” he said in a teasing, husky whisper, but as he spoke, the words rang in his head, an echo from the past. Suddenly he understood. Once before they had loved one another—innocently, but just as passionately—and his promises had become dust in a Texas wind. Now, at last, they had reclaimed that feeling of togetherness, and Amy was terrified of it being torn away from her. Swift’s heart broke a little as he lay down and drew her close. “Amy, listen to me. Nothing will ever keep us apart again. Nothing. I won’t allow it. Besides, I’m just going up the street. It’s within hollering distance.”
She pressed close, burying her face against his neck. “It seems like a hundred miles.”
Swift sighed. “I don’t want you to lose your job. I know you need that security, at least for a while.”
“I need you more.”
“You can have both. We’re married now, Amy. You know it; I know it. Nothing and no one can change that.” He tucked in his chin to press a kiss atop her head, loving the feel of her silken hair, heavy against his shirt. “And with marriage comes all the things you fear. For the first year or so, while you’re walking a circle around me and learning what I’m like when—”
“I don’t care about that now.” Even as she spoke, Amy knew she was suffering from momentary madness. Later on she would care. There was no getting around that. Henry Masters had left his mark, whether she could admit it right now or not.
Swift closed his eyes, knowing that the scars within her ran too deep to pretend they were healed by one night of lovemaking. He wished that could be, but wishing would never make it so.
“I do care,” he whispered, his voice gravelly. He drew her up onto his chest and released his hold on her to catch her face between his hands. “If you lose that job, you’ll be dependent on me for everything. Sooner or later that’s going to eat at you.”
“But—” Amy broke off, despising herself because what he said was true.
He slanted a finger across her mouth. “No buts. You don’t have to give up everything to be my wife, Amy. We can go on like we have been until the priest comes. I’ll be here every night, for lessons. And maybe I’ll stay some nights until right before dawn. Nothing’s going to separate us again. I swear it.”
Amy let him leave with no further argument. Long after his departure, she lay shivering in her lonely bed, wishing he were there beside her, hating herself because her weakness had held them apart for so long and now it still held them apart.
After school the following day, Amy went by Loretta’s for her usual brief visit. To her surprise, both Swift and Hunter were at the house when she walked in. Taken off guard, Amy closed the door, then stood there, uncertain how to greet Swift after their night together.
“Ah, Amy, you’re just in time for hot blackberry cobbler!” Loretta exclaimed.
“Th-that sounds wonderful,” Amy said weakly, her mind filled with thoughts of apple pie. When she had gotten up this morning, she hadn’t found a trace of the mess in her kitchen. Swift had cleaned it up while she slept.
Her gaze collided with his. Memories of their lovemaking spun through her head. She dropped her gaze, groping for her poise, but everything about him reminded her, even his shirt, which only a few short hours ago had lain against her bare breasts.
Swift saw the flush as it started up Amy’s neck, and to call it crimson would have been understatement. It flooded her face, inching to her hairline, so obvious that he knew Hunter and Loretta couldn’t fail to notice. Tender amusement warmed him, and he bit back a smile. Sweet, precious Amy in her schoolmarm dress, with her glorious hair wound in a prim coronet about her head. To her, their lovemaking last night had been scandalous.
The smile inside him became an ache in his throat as he recalled how tame their joining had actually been. She’d bust her seams when he made real love to her. And if she blushed like this afterward, everyone in town would know what she’d been up to.
Trying to pretend nothing was amiss, Swift rubbed his hands together. “Well, dish that cobbler up, Loretta. I’m so hungry my legs feel hollow.”
The attempt at joviality fell flat. Loretta stood frozen, staring at Amy, who was turning a brighter red by the second. Hunter, instead of staring at Amy, had turned his dark blue gaze on Swift, one eyebrow arched in question. When Swift made eye contact with him, Hunter’s mouth quirked. He glanced at Amy.
“Amy, love, is something wrong?” Loretta asked.
Amy’s eyes seemed to grow larger than the pie plates sitting on the table, startling splashes of blue in contrast with her flushed face. Swift nearly groaned. “N-no, nothing,” she squeaked, which was clearly the biggest untruth she had ever uttered. “Wh-why do you ask?”
Loretta threw a glance at Hunter. Amy turned pleading eyes to Swift. To his horror, he felt his neck getting hot, and then the heat spread to his face. Damned if he wasn’t blushing. He cleared his throat and raked a hand through his hair, as embarrassed as if he had just been caught tumbling Amy in the hayloft. Hunter, grinning like an ass, turned his attention to the cobbler and picked up the server.