Gideon, Robin - Desire of the Phantom [Ecstasy in the Old West] (Siren Publishing Classic) (30 page)

When Pamela at last opened her eyes, there were still a dozen people surrounding her, but now she looked upon them with the contempt they had previously shown her.

Fine,
she thought,
if Garrett can’t take me with him to
the governor’s mansion, if all I can have is this night with
him, then I’m going to make the most of it
—
starting right
now!

She turned and began walking back to the ballroom
where she’d left him. The forcefulness of her stride encouraged people to step out of the way as she approached them. When a group of four men
saw her coming, they snickered and turned collectively to face her so that she would need to walk around them. Pamela
would have none of it, and she shoved her way through their ranks.

“Pushy wench, isn’t she?” one of them muttered.

Pamela wheeled on the
man and pointed a finger in his face. “Damn right, little man! Don’t ever get in my way!”

The man’s eyes got wide as saucers, and though he
wanted to come back with a snappy response, he remained
silent, unable to think of a single word to say.

As she approached Garrett, Pamela detected pain in his eyes.
She knew then he had heard about her embarrassment. People standing near him, no doubt relating every hideous detail of her ordeal, moved away quickly.

At that moment, Pamela hated everyone in the ballroom,
everyone at the dance. Everyone but Garrett, the high society lawyer whose life path was already predetermined for him, planned in such minute detail that it could never be altered sufficiently to allow Pamela Bragg to join him on it.

“Pamela, I just heard and—”

She raised her hands, placing the pads of her fingers lightly upon his lips to silence him. Looking up into his eyes, she smiled as best she could, summoning
the courage and strength to hide the
pain she now felt. She was determined to press forward
with allowing her desires to blossom. The wine would be
her ally against the inhibitions that had previously held her back.

“Garrett, my Garrett,” she whispered, stifling a hiccup.
She slipped her hand around the back of his neck, pulling him down so that she could whisper into his ear. “I know
you’re the Midnight Phantom. I knew the moment you
kissed me, my darling. And unless we leave this minute,
you and I are going to be making love in the middle of
this ballroom, though quite frankly I’d rather not have an
audience.”

She turned and began walking, not sure where she was going in the huge mansion, only knowing that every sec
ond she spent without Garrett’s arms around her was wasted.

Pamela smiled. She’d heard that
champagne was an aphrodisiac, and now she knew it was
true.

Chapter Fourteen

Garrett was a jumble of chaotic emotions. Pamela knew?
From the first moment he’d kissed her?

Not only had he been unsuccessful in hiding his identity
as the Midnight Phantom from Pamela, but the attack
by Angie Darwell added to his chaotic mental state. How was Pamela taking
the accursed dance?

He followed her as she hurried through the crowd of people, her blue-green skirts rustling, her strides long and
powerful. As Garrett increased his speed to catch up to her, she increased hers accordingly, and when she looked over
her shoulder at him, there was a smile on her face, a bril
liant green light shining in her eyes, and a glow to her that
was at once exciting and mystifying.

What did Angie say to put Pamela in such a good mood?
Garrett wondered as he picked up speed once again trying
to catch her. Any faster and he’d be proceeding at an ab
solutely undignified jog, and though he already had much
to explain, he didn’t want to have to add tackling her to
stop her.

Maybe she wasn’t
really
in a good mood. Maybe it was
feigned for his benefit, a brave facade put forward for him.

She had said she wanted to make love. Though Garrett
was reluctant to take advantage of a painful situation, the
opportunity to make love to the beautiful Pamela was some
thing he simply couldn’t resist

He reached out, his fingertips almost touching the
puffed shoulder of her gown. Pamela looked at him once again
over her shoulder, and a giggle of delight escaped her moist, lightly rouged, utterly kissable lips. She raised her skirts just a little, striding even faster than before, almost run
ning now.

“Damn it, Pamela, wait,” Garrett said, much more loudly
than he’d wanted to.

The expressions on the guests he passed had ranged from sympathetic to confused. The dance was buzzing
with the news of what Angie had done and said to Pamela. But
only Garrett realized that Angie’s cruelty had been the mo
tivating force behind Pamela’s decision to flaunt convention
and seduce the Midnight Phantom as quickly as possible.

An inebriated Andy Fields was standing in the foyer, near the base of the long, winding stairway leading up to
the second floor. When he saw Garrett approaching so quickly, he grabbed his arm and held on tight. Garrett’s
strength nearly toppled Fields over.

“What’s the rush, old boy?” Fields asked, weaving just a little, rather pleased with himself that he’d managed to
stop Garrett. The two men were political rivals.

Garrett knocked Fields’s hand away, furious with the damn
fool. Pamela was already ascending the stairs, providing a flash
of white stocking and calf beneath the skirt she raised to
make it easier for her to take the stairs quickly.

“There’s no need to be testy,” Fields continued, oblivi
ous to all that was happening around him. “I just wanted
to have a word with you.”

With every step, Pamela felt as though she had been freed
from a gigantic spider web. Once ensnared, she’d tried to
fit into that web, and the more she struggled to fit, the
more entangled she’d become. She had tried to fit into Garrett’s world and had been insulted for her efforts. By
not trying, by no longer caring what anyone thought of
her behavior except herself and Garrett, she had at last freed
herself to be the woman she truly was.

Pamela had just reached the top of the stairs when Garrett
finally pushed Andy Fields aside. She smiled down at him
as another laugh worked its way through her. Then she
rushed down the hallway, having no idea of where she was going, her body at a fever pitch of excitement.

From behind, Garrett called out to her, demanding that
she stop immediately.

“Try and catch me!” she challenged, not caring at all
who might hear what she had to say.

She reached the end of the hall and followed it left. A
man and woman stood in the dimly lit corridor, their lips
pressed tightly together in a passionate kiss. They stopped
and looked at her.

“Don’t stop for me,” Pamela said to them as she whisked
past with a rustle of satin.

The echoing of bootheels hitting the floor told Pamela
that Garrett had decided to put an end to the chase. She could hear him running.

If she did not decide now which room to choose, she
would be making love to the impatient Garrett there in the
hallway!

She turned a doorknob and stepped into a dark room, illuminated only by moonlight streaming through a nar
row window on the far side. It was not, as she had hoped,
a bedroom. Rather, it was a linen closet of some sort, with
towels and sheets stacked up high on the shelves along
the walls.

She hadn’t been in the small room five seconds before the door burst open and Garrett stepped in. He kicked the
door shut as he reached for her. Pamela offered no resistance
when he pulled her into his arms, crushing her body
against his own, kissing her fiercely, passionately.

“I want you, Phantom,” she whispered, her head reeling
with excitement. She was painfully aware of her own in
experience in such matters, and she could only hope that
he would know what to do. “I want you now. Right now. Right here.”

She was turned then forced backward. A moment later she hit the hard
surface of the door by which she’d just entered. Garrett held
her face in his hands, keeping her head at the most advantageous angle for his kisses. His tongue pressed be
tween her lips, deeply entering her mouth, and Pamela
welcomed the intimacy of it.

“Garrett, Phantom,” she whispered, pushing her hands inside
his jacket to feel the solid, sinewy muscles beneath the
smooth silkiness of his white shirt.

“This is madness,” he replied, his own passion blazing
out of control.

He’d spent virtually all his adult life doing everything
he possibly could to maintain an appearance of decorum, even while
endlessly pursuing women. In the back of his mind, he
was aware that, at that very moment downstairs, tongues
were wagging, telling version after distorted version of
how he had chased after Pamela. No one, with the exception of the man and woman in the hallway now completely lost in a kiss, had
seen him enter the closet.

He pressed Pamela harder against the door then darted his
tongue between her lips, playing it against hers. He was
aware of her fingers against his chest, pressing against
his pectorals and ribs. He’d been touched a hundred times
before, but no hands pleased him quite so much as these.

“I need you, Garrett,” she whispered hotly.

The passion in her voice fired Garrett’s blood. He filled
his hands with her breasts, squeezing them hard, enjoying
their fullness while Pamela writhed in bliss. He wanted to
free her breasts, to feel their silky luxuriance without the
encumbrance of the gown’s bodice, but there were far too
many buttons, and his blood was much too hot to allow
for such patience.

Pamela shivered, arching her back to thrust her breasts
even more firmly into Garrett’s hands. When he released
her, she sighed loudly, about to complain. Words were
impossible because Garrett’s mouth was over hers once
again, taking away her breath, kissing away any complaint
she even considered. And when she felt her skirts being
raised high, her sigh of anticipation sounded much more
worldly than Pamela truly was.

His lips were wet and warm against her throat as his
hands brushed aside layers of satin and cotton. Pamela
wrapped her arms around Garrett’s neck, holding onto
him for support yet not wanting to impede him. She leaned
back against the door, her shoulders pressed hard against the solid surface, her feet moving forward and spreading
just a little farther apart. When Garrett’s hand came up, brushing against her silk-sheathed inner thigh, moving
over the stocking top until the length of his strong fingers
were pressed against her pussy, the pressure was firm and exhilarating even through the overwashed cotton bar
rier of her drawers.

The startled cry of ecstasy that was ripped from Pamela’s
throat was one of uninhibited passion. She tossed her head
back as the pressing fingers found the bud of her desire, tantalizing that small, excitable clit with consummate
skill. In an oddly disconnected way, she thought about her
drawers and how incongruous they were with the rest of her ensemble. Gretchen had remembered to bring all
new clothes for her, with the exception of drawers. Would
Garrett be disappointed in them since they were not made of fine-quality silk but were old and slightly frayed from
having been washed so many times?

Why think of that now? It couldn’t possibly matter to him, she told herself. But it mattered to Pamela, and she promised herself
that one day she would have beautiful lingerie, which she
would wear specifically for Garrett’s pleasure.

“This is insane.” His whispered words came out muffled, his face buried in Pamela’s cleavage.

His hands were beneath her skirt, his fingers trembling
with need as he sought the drawstring of her drawers. When he found it at last, he loosened the knot, and dropped to his knees before her. His fingers curling into
the waistband to pull the drawers down her thighs
and legs.

Pamela was as frantic as Garrett, perhaps more so. With his
help, she pulled one slippered foot out of her cotton drawers
. The ache within her was overpowering, its intensity frightening. Her hands were still on Garrett’s shoulders, her
fingers clutching at the collar of his jacket. She expected
him to stand, though she still was unsure of exactly what
he intended to do. She knew only that she wanted him inside her, that she wanted to feel his great strength, his power, his passion for life and for her.

“You’ll be the death of me, but I must have you,” she heard Garrett say. He sounded helpless against the power of his desire for her, and the knowledge of her influence over this pragmatic man excited Pamela even more.