A Promise to Cherish (23 page)

“Oh, Sam, I was so afraid to have you see those marks the first time. Afraid of your disapproval, and . . . and wanting to be perfect when I couldn’t be. But that’s what love does to you, makes you want to be flawless for the one you love.”

He pulled back to look up at her. “Cherokee . . .” His dark eyes were eloquent with approval even before he spoke the words. “I wouldn’t change a single thing about you, don’t you know that?” He reached one dark hand up to cup a breast, lifting it slightly as he brushed its crest with his thumb, yet looking beyond it to her eyes.

And suddenly she did know it, just as she knew she loved this warm, complex man. She threaded the fingers of both hands back through the hair of his temples, then held the sides of his head while savoring the moment and him.

“I know,” she finally breathed softly. Then she leaned to kiss his lips, lightly at first, but with growing ardor, until she felt his hands moving over her skin to the loosened waistband that was soon being eased over the backs of her thighs. When it threatened to trip her, he stood, his hands sliding up her ribs to her armpits until she felt herself being lifted into space. He held her effortlessly, his mouth teasing her jaw while she pressed her hands to his hard shoulders and kicked herself free of impediments. But when the clothes dropped to the floor, he still held her aloft.

“Sam, Sam, let me go,” she said, feeling helpless and impatient, wriggled provocatively against him.

“Never.” He smiled back, then she was sliding down his body, freeing the single button that held his shirt together at the waist. While he shrugged it off hastily, she loosened his belt buckle.

Suddenly she realized he was standing motionless, and her fingers fell still. She looked up to find him watching her with the faint hint of a smile on his lips.

How incredible that after all they’d been through she could feel this abrupt shyness, as if it were her first time. His hands hung loosely at his sides, and the expression on his face was a mixture of enjoyment and anticipation.

“Be my guest,” he said softly.

Her lips fell open. A thrill spiraled through her while the breath seemed caught in her throat. Then she accepted his invitation, pulling the last garments from between them.

When they were naked, it took no more than a step and he was against her, forcing her back until her calves struck the bed and she toppled backward, pulling him with her. Their bodies were all grace and harmony while their mouths spoke wordless intimate messages and their hands roamed over each other, familiarizing themselves once again. “Oh, Sam, how I missed you.” His shoulders were sleek and firm, his hair the texture of mink, the tendons of his neck resilient as she ran her hands over them. He leaned above her, kissing her temple, her eyelids, catching her lip between his teeth while her eyes drifted closed and she took pleasure in his adulation.

He moved down, turning them onto their sides while trailing kisses from the underside of her chin along her throat and down the hollow between her breasts, detouring to bestow a lingering kiss on each before moving on. His elbow hooked the curve of her waist, and his forearm pressed silkily against her back while he dipped a pleasurably wet tribute into her navel. He pressed her back, easing lower to trace once more those pale lines she no longer thought of hiding, learning their texture with the tip of his tongue.

“Cherokee . . .” His voice was rough, his lips soft while he nuzzled lower . . . and lower. “Cherokee . . .”

Then all was sensation—rough to smooth, ebb to flow, texture to sleekness, man to woman. She made some inarticulate sound deep in her throat, raising her body while drifting in an ethereal realm of sensuality.

He took her just short of fulfillment, then came to her, lifting himself over her once again to join the force of his love with hers in movements that were as much a part of love’s expression as its innermost urge to give and to share.

Lee’s head was thrown back, her eyes closed as she reached above her for something to hold on to, finding nothing but a pillow into which her fingers curled while he watched the pleasure in her trembling eyelids.

His name ripped from her throat as they shared again that shattering force of feeling they’d known before, followed by the dissolving sigh of satisfaction. A kiss on her forehead, the weight shifting away, taking her with it to her side, a heavy hand threaded through her hair, then a blissful lassitude as they lay in each other’s arms.

“Cherokee?” he murmured after a long, long time.

“Hmm?”

His chest was warm and damp where her forehead rested against it.

“Can we talk now?”

“The answer is yes,” she said, smiling at the ebullient feeling it gave her to say the word at last.

“The . . . what?” He jerked back in surprise.

“The answer is yes.” She looked up innocently into his eyes. “Yes, I’ll marry you. Yes, yes, yes!” She kissed his chest with a quick, light smack.

And naturally he had to tease, “I didn’t ask you yet.”

“You were gonna.”

“Oh, was I now?”

She snuggled up against him, wrapping her arms around him and nestling comfortably with her head tucked under his chin.

He lifted a knee, rested it on her hip, and pressed the sole of his foot in the warm hollow at the back of her leg. “You know what I kept thinking the last six weeks?” His tone was reflective. “Of what a damn fool I was the night I asked you to marry me. My timing stank. I know that now. You were in an emotional mess that night, and I had no business bringing up the subject just then. I thought . . .” He sifted his fingers through her hair as if it were sand. “I thought I’d give you some time to gain your equilibrium after seeing your kids and your ex-husband again.”

“You had me so scared, Sam.” She squeezed her eyes shut, then hugged him close with fierce possessiveness. “I’ve never suffered as badly as I have during the last six weeks. You were so . . . so . . . unaffected by it all.”

“Unaffected!” he exclaimed, pushing her back to see her face. “Woman, I was dying a little bit each day, waiting for you to come to me and say you’d changed your mind.”

“You were?” She widened her eyes in surprise. “You didn’t act like you were dying. You acted as if I was just one of the boys.”

“Just one of the boys?” The grin was back as he ran his eyes then his hand over one naked breast. “Oh, Cherokee, hardly. It’s not one of the boys I want to share my house with . . . and my life with . . . to say nothing of my bed.”

She smiled and felt a ripple of feminine vanity at his approval.

Then she fell serious, gazing up at him with concern. “Sam, have you really no fears at all?”

He pressed a kiss to her forehead. “None. Not since that first incredible weekend with you when we found out how much we can share.”

“But . . .” She searched his eyes deeply, hoping he wouldn’t misconstrue what she was about to say. “I do have fears, Sam. Please understand.”

“I know, Cherokee. I know now.”

“At least give me some time before we start a family, okay?”

His head snapped back and he braced up on one palm, a dark hand grasping her shoulder and rolling her onto her back. “You mean it, Cherokee? You’ve been thinking about . . . about kids?”

“Yes, Your Honor, I have to confess I have.” She affected a scolding pout. “Not right away, mind you. After I have a little time to get used to the idea.”

His smile was radiant, then to her amazement he gave a regular Indian war whoop and fell on his back beside her, rubbing his chest with an air of great satisfaction and smiling up at the ceiling.

She lay beside him, grinning at how happy she’d made him, wondering what one of their half-Indian babies would look like. It would have hair darker than his, beautiful eyes, with his long lashes instead of her short, stubby ones, and the prettiest lips this side of the Great Divide . . .

Her reverie was interrupted by the growing awareness that Sam was no longer looking at the ceiling but at her naked breasts. The message in his eyes was clear even before a dark finger came teasing.

“Hey, Cherokee, what do you say we jump in the shower together and start all over and celebrate? I’ve got some time to make up for.”

She burst out laughing and shoved his finger aside. “What have you been doing over there in your room all by yourself? Reading your porn magazines again?”

“How did you guess?”

She pretended to consider a minute. “On second thought, I’m not sure if I should hitch up for life with a man who reads porn magazines when he’s got a perfectly capable wife.” She sat up saucily and was heading for the edge of the bed when her progress was checked abruptly. A second later she squealed, “Brown! Let me go, Brown! I gotta go to the bathroom!”

“Not alone, Cherokee! You’re going with me, straight to the shower!” In a flash she was slung ignominiously over his shoulder, her black hair dangling down past his posterior while one dark forearm clamped behind her knees and his other hand rested on her upturned derrière.

“Brown, put me down!”

“Like hell.” He chuckled and stalked off toward the bathroom.

“Pervert!” she squawked.

“You damn betcha,” he agreed, then turned to bite her enticing backside playfully as it bounced along on his shoulder.

She could hardly breathe by the time they reached the bathroom and he let her slip to her feet. She landed in the cold, hard bathtub, and a minute later the colder spray hit her full in the face. Before it warmed, they were kissing and slipping against each other and groping for the tiny bar of soap.

While Sam unwrapped it, she pushed her sodden hair out of her eyes.

“Hey, Brown, I’ve got just one more question, and I think I deserve an answer.”

Disgruntled by the interruption, he curled his brows. “Okay, what—but hurry up and get it over with so we can get on with the important stuff.”

“Did you read the amount of my bid that day we first met?”

A slow, sly grin climbed his cheek. He shut his eyes, leaned his head back till the shower spray hit him full in the face, then brought it forward, shook his head like a dog, and opened his spiky-lashed eyes again. “I’ll tell you what.” He pulled her up close, settled his hips against hers, and taunted with a grin, “You do
ev-v-
erything I say and I’ll think about answering that.”

“Brown—” she started to scold playfully, but the word was cut in half by his wet lips, and a moment later the answer ceased to matter.

A PROMISE TO CHERISH
FORSAKING ALL OTHERS
THEN CAME HEAVEN
SMALL TOWN GIRL
THAT CAMDEN SUMMER
HOME SONG
FAMILY BLESSINGS
NOVEMBER OF THE HEART
BYGONES
FORGIVING
BITTER SWEET
MORNING GLORY
SPRING FANCY
THE HELLION
VOWS
THE GAMBLE
YEARS
SEPARATE BEDS
TWICE LOVED
SWEET MEMORIES
HUMMINGBIRD
THE ENDEARMENT
THE FULFILLMENT