An Improper Proposal (33 page)

Perfectly ignorant of his presence—he’d seen whores who were a good deal more modest, even when thinking they were unobserved—Payton raised her arms to massage the cool water into her scalp, throwing her head back to reveal the long column of her throat. She was slender as a reed, built on a much smaller scale than most women, yet there was no denying that her curves, though subtle, were very much there. She turned toward the spray, presenting him with an unimpeded view of her bare backside, and he found that he had to sit down, of a sudden, on a nearby stone. Those buttocks, which he’d noted through her trousers were pleasingly round, came together in a perfect heart shape below her small waist. He was going to have to rethink his plan of making her wear men’s clothing from this day forward. It would not do for that backside to be revealed to anyone but him, and trousers would certainly show it off disgracefully.

Flour sacks. He was going to have to see that from now on, she wore only flour sacks. That was the only possible answer. Anything else would be too revealing.

As he sat there, unable to take his eyes off her, he became conscious of an unpleasant dampness beneath him. He looked down and saw that he was sitting on his drawers. They had been, near as he could tell, thoroughly washed, then laid out to dry upon the rocks surrounding the spring. Glancing around, he recognized his trousers, then Payton’s shirt and vest, similarly strewn in the sun to dry. Well, that explained the mystery of his disappearing breeches. Then he raised an eyebrow, and turned his gaze back toward the bather on the rocks. So the little minx had undressed him. Saved his life; undressed him; then done his laundry. Here was a woman worth far more than her weight in jewels.

He was ruminating on this fact when the woman in question turned around and spotted him. Pushing some wet hair from her eyes, she peered at him as if she couldn’t quite believe what she was seeing.

Then she let out a bloodcurdling scream, and jumped into the spring.

Drake sat where he was, the scream echoing in his ears. The shrill sound had frightened a flock of parrots from the treetops. Squawking indignantly, they took flight, their wings flapping noisily. Payton, who’d disappeared beneath the water’s surface, remerged suddenly. Wiping water from her eyes, she blinked up at him.

“Drake?” she asked breathlessly. “Is that really you?”

He looked down at himself. “I believe so.”

“Oh, my God.” She was treading water. The pool was only six or seven feet deep, but Payton hardly stood higher than five. Her feet could not find purchase on the rocky bottom. And if she thought the water opaque enough to hide her nakedness, she was sadly mistaken. He could see far more, as a matter of fact, than before, since she had to kick her legs open to stay afloat.

“When I turned,” she said panting, “and saw you there, I had water in my eyes, and I didn’t recognize you, and I thought … Are you all right?”

He looked down at himself again. “I conscientiously believe so.”

“Because you didn’t stir.” She was paddling around the pool, looking for a place where she could climb out without hurting her bare feet on the rocks. She was talking every bit as fast as she was paddling. “I was so worried. You never stirred all night. Are you sure you’re all right?”

He grinned. He simply couldn’t help it. Never in his life had he felt such an immense attraction to a woman. It was absurd, because she wasn’t making the slightest effort to entice him. But that only served to remind him—as if he needed reminding—of how very different she was from all the simpering, flirtatious females he’d known before. Payton Dixon wouldn’t have known how to flirt if her life depended on it. And simper? Forget about it.

Drake, feeling suddenly, ridiculously happy, happier than he could ever remember being, stood up and strode purposefully to the edge of the spring. Below him, Payton’s eyes went round as saucers.

“W-what do you think you’re doing?” she asked.

“Joining you.” Drake dipped a toe into the crystal-clear water.

Payton seemed unable to tear her gaze from the region of his body located directly below his navel. Looking down, Drake noted that his state of arousal was blatantly apparent. Toc late, he remembered how dark it had been that night in his cell, when they’d first made love. Albeit unknowingly, he’d just supplied Payton with her first daylight glimpse of the nude male form.

And she did not appear the least bit enthusiastic about what she’d seen.

“Um, that’s all right,” Payton stammered, paddling away from him with alacrity. “I was just getting out—”

Drake realized rapid action was necessary. Always one to keep a cool head in a crisis, he stepped off the rocks, and plunged into the cool water.

Payton, enveloped in the wave created by Drake’s enormous body entering the pool, came out of it sputtering. It wasn’t so much the water she was choking on, but the knowledge of what that water hid, now that Drake was in it. It appeared that there was a great deal more to that part of Connor Drake that she’d only felt before, but never really seen, than she’d previously thought. So much more, in fact, that it seemed retreat was probably the best strategy at this point. Before he’d even surfaced, she was heading for shore.

But she didn’t get very far. Some sort of underwater tentacle reached out and wrapped around one of her ankles, firmly stopping her in her flight.

Drake finally broke the surface, his tawny hair plastered to his head, but he didn’t let go of her ankle. In fact, he seemed to be reeling her in by it, the way a fisherman reeled in his catch. First his free hand, the one not wrapped around her ankle, encircled her knee, and then a thigh, and then, inexorably, her waist, until he was drawing her close to him with both arms. And all the while, he was smiling at her in a gentle manner that really wasn’t doing her heartstrings the least bit of good.

Payton, her pulse thundering in her ears, still had the presence of mind to stammer, “I think m-maybe you ought to rest a little longer—”

“No, thank you,” was his polite reply. “I’ve had quite enough of resting.”

And then he was kissing her. But it was not, to her surprise, a hard, possessive kiss. No, it was gentle … like his smile.

At least, it started out gently. It wasn’t until she made the mistake—and she realized it was a mistake the moment she did it—of meeting his probing tongue with a daring, inquisitive thrust of her own, that the kiss went from gentle to wild—and in just half a heartbeat, too. One second, he’d been kissing her tenderly, and the next, his month’s growth of beard was razing the tender skin around her mouth as his lips seemed to engulf hers.

She had told herself when she’d removed his pants that morning that under no circumstance was she going to repeat what had happened on the
Rebecca
. That, she knew now, hadn’t been fair of her. Connor Drake was an extremely virile man, and that had been why he’d reacted the way he had when she’d thrown herself at him. True, he’d said he loved her … but he’d felt he had to say something like that, because she’d been a virgin, and she supposed he’d felt guilty …

Though it had been all her doing. She had been in love with him for most of her life, and had been actively pursuing him for the last several months. Lord, he had probably only given in to her lustful demands out of pity, or boredom, or the conviction that he was going to be put to death any minute, so why not enjoy the time he had left? He certainly couldn’t have been telling the truth when he’d said he loved her.

Or could he?

Because now … now there was no reason for him to be kissing her like this, no reason at all. He could have ignored her. He could have walked away, when he found her bathing there, and she’d never have been the wiser, not having noticed him until he’d been standing there some little while, judging from the evidence of his arousal.

Oh, bloody hell. Of course he was attracted to her. He was obviously attracted to her. And she had not thrown herself at him this time—quite the opposite, in fact. What did it matter, whether or not he’d been telling the truth when he’d said he loved her? Wasn’t his kiss convincing enough that he was … well, fond of her, anyway?

Her firm decision never to make love with him again crumbled into dust the second his lips touched hers. For one thing, she couldn’t very well push him away: his strong arms around her were all that kept her afloat. And for another thing, the feel of his naked body as he pressed it against hers was unlike anything she had ever known: the way his chest hair teased her nipples as it brushed up against them; the cool hardness of the thigh he insinuated between hers, brushing once—as if by accident, and then again, proving it was no accident at all—the soft, pulsing mound between her legs. Her hands were on his broad shoulders, shoulders that just the night before had glowed hotly red, but which had already turned to a deep bronze. She could feel the muscles beneath that tanned skin contract as his arms tightened around her. It seemed as if he couldn’t kiss her deeply enough, or press his body close enough to hers.

Why hadn’t anyone told her how good it felt, having a man’s skin against one’s own? Mei-Ling had never mentioned it. Georgiana had never said a word. Why hadn’t she ever tried this before? She ought to have ripped Drake’s clothes off that night, back on the
Rebecca
. But she’d been too overwhelmed by other sensations to think of it …

Then Drake’s lips left hers. Gripping her naked bottom—almost the way he had that night in the garden, so long ago—he lifted her from the water, holding her slick and dripping high above him, until his mouth was level with her breasts. And then he pressed those lips that had so firmly entrapped her to one hardened nipple.

She groaned. She couldn’t help it, the contrast between the cool water and the heat of his tongue was so delicious. And her groan seemed to do something to him. He tore his lips from her breast and lowered her in his arms until he could smother her mouth in quick, greedy kisses. Suddenly, the hard male thigh that had been brushing against her, lightly as a silverfish, pressed quite emphatically between her legs. And like the wanton thing she knew she was, Payton responded by moving against it in an imitation of the love act.

The next thing she knew, he’d lifted her out of the water again. Only this time, instead of his hands, she felt something cool and hard beneath her buttocks. Looking down, she saw that he’d placed her on a natural shelf formed by one of the flat boulders that surrounded the pool. Payton couldn’t think what he meant by it until she realized he was standing between her thighs, in water shallow enough that she was given an unimpeded view of the part of him she’d touched without the least temerity when it had been safely clothed; that organ which, because she lacked it, she’d blamed for any number of disappointments in her life, most recently the loss of the
Constant
.

Only now she had to say a little prayer of thanks that she had been born a female. Because otherwise, there would have been no reason for Drake to open her gently, as he did then, with his fingers, while at the same time invading her mouth with lips and tongue, an assault on so many fronts that Payton was helpless to put up any resistance whatsoever. She could only let out a little murmur of appreciation, and spread her legs even farther apart …

That seemed to be invitation enough for Drake to replace those fingers with something a good deal larger.

And then she couldn’t talk, she couldn’t even think, because his lips were on her neck again, his hands on her hips, and he was moving, slowly, out of her, when he’d only just gotten in, and it felt so good, having him there, so where was he going?

She moved her hips, pulling him greedily back inside. She felt him suck in his breath.

And then he said her name, in a voice that was halfway between a growl and a groan, and his mouth was crushing hers, his hands clenching her buttocks, while his hips moved with frantic urgency between her legs. She could understand the urgency, because she felt it, too. Her entire being was focused upon Drake, on his ragged breathing, the coarseness of the stubble on his chin as it raked her mouth and throat, and above all, on the force behind each thrust, as he plunged so deeply within her.

Her climax, when it came, was nothing like the ones that she’d experienced before, back in Drake’s cell. It seemed to her as if one moment, every nerve ending within her was taut with frustration, and the next, she was drowning in a lava flow—yes, a lava flow, even though the volcano on San Rafael was long dead. She was burning up in a sea of fire and light, wave after wave of liquid gold pouring over her. Though she didn’t know it, the cry she let out was as much a sob as a scream, and hearing it, Drake lost all semblance of self-control. He gave one final thrust, driving himself as deeply into her as he could, no longer conscious of whether or not he hurt her, seeking only release.

It came, washing over him in torrents, powerful spasms of relief, and he roared his pleasure with such force that he startled the same flock of parrots she’d alarmed earlier with her scream. He collapsed against her, and for a moment all Payton was conscious of was the pounding rhythm of his racing heart, the heavy weight of his body against hers, and the soft breeze that had begun to blow in from the sea, cooling her fevered skin.

And then she realized, with something akin to awe, that this—this, right now, right this moment—was what she had always wanted, what she’d been waiting for her entire life, it seemed. To have Connor Drake in her arms, his heart beating against her own … she had never asked for anything more than that, not once.

She felt it appropriate to utter a quick prayer of thanks. She hoped it wasn’t sacrilegious to pray naked. But since the Lord had made her that way she didn’t suppose He’d mind too much.

“You can’t just wade up to one and heave the knife through it,” he said, as they lay on their stomachs, looking down into the pool. “You’ve got to wait until it comes to you.” Drake was trying to impress upon her the subtleties of spearing fish.

Payton took a bite out of the banana she held. “Drake,” she said. “Why do I have to know this?”