Hard to Handle (9 page)

She pleaded fatigue after a nonstop hour on the dance floor and found her way to the powder room upstairs. By the time she came down, Hunter had apparently come out of hiding because an older socialite had him cornered by a potted plant against one wall. He looked irritated and half angry, and Jennifer felt a surge of sympathy, although God alone knew why she should.

She started toward him, hesitated, and he looked up at that moment and his eyes kindled. He even smiled.

That had to mean he was desperate for rescue. He never smiled at her. Well, he was going to get his rescue, but she was going to enjoy it. She moved toward him with pure witchery in her movements, patting her hair back into place.

“Here I am, sweetheart!” she called in a rich exaggerated Southern drawl. “Did you think I’d gotten lost?” She draped herself over his side, feeling him stiffen. A mischievous sense of pleasure flooded through her. Well, he’d asked for it. She smiled thinly at the older woman, who was watching her with narrow, cold eyes. “Hello. I don’t think we’ve met. I’m Jennifer Marist. Hunter and I work for an oil corporation in Oklahoma. It’s so rarely that we get to enjoy a fabulous party like this, isn’t it, darling?” she asked, blinking her long lashes up at him.

“Rarely,” he agreed, but his eyes were promising retribution. He was already half out of humor from watching her pass from one pair of masculine arms to another. Then this social shark had attacked. He’d been desperate enough to encourage Jennifer to rescue him, but he hadn’t exactly expected this type of rescue. Fortunately his expression gave nothing away.

“I was just telling Mr. Hunter that I’d love to have him join me for a late supper,” the older woman said, blatantly ignoring
Jennifer’s apparent possessiveness. She smiled at Hunter, diamonds dripping from her ears and her thin neck. “I want to hear all about his tribe. I’ve never met a real Indian before.”

Hunter’s jaw clenched, but Jennifer smiled.

“I know, isn’t it fascinating?” Jennifer confided. “Did you know that he rubs himself all over with bear grease every night at bedtime? It’s a ritual. And he keeps rattlesnakes,” she whispered, “to use in fertility dances outside during full moons. You really must get him to show you the courting dance. It’s done with deer heads and pouches full of dried buffalo chips….”

The older woman was looking a little frantic. “Excuse me,” she said breathlessly, staring around as if she were looking for a life preserver. “I see someone I must speak to!”

She shot off without another word and Jennifer had to smother a giggle. “Oh, God, I’m sorry,” she whispered. “It was the way she said it…”

He was laughing, too, if the glitter in his eyes and the faint uplift of his lips could be called that. “Bear grease,” he muttered. “That wasn’t the Apache, you idiot. And the dance a young girl does at her very special coming-of-age ceremony is done with a pouch of pollen, for fertility, not dried buffalo chips.”

“Do you want me to call her back and tell her the truth?” she offered.

He shook his head. His dark eyes slid over her body in the clinging dress, and there was a definite appreciation in them. “If I have to suffer a woman for the rest of the evening, I’d prefer you,” he said, startling her. “At least you won’t ask embarrassing questions about my cultural background.”

“Thanks a lot,” she murmured. “And after that daring rescue, too.”

“Rescue, yes. Daring?” He shook his head. “Hardly.” He chuckled
deeply. “You little terror. I ought to tie you to a chair and smear honey on you.”

“You have to do that in the desert, where you can find ants,” she reminded him. “You asked to be rescued, you know you did.”

“This wasn’t exactly what I had in mind,” he muttered.

“Was she trying to put the make on you?” she asked, all eyes.

He glared at her. “No. She was trying to find out how many scalps I had in my teepee.”

“Apaches didn’t have teepees, they had wickiups,” she said knowledgeably. “I hope you told her.”

His eyebrows rose. “Who’s the Indian here, you or me?”

“I think one of my great-grandfather’s adoptive cousins was Lower Creek,” she frowned thoughtfully.

“God help us!”

“I could have just kept on walking,” she reminded him. “I didn’t have to save you from that woman.”

“No, you didn’t. But before it happens again, I’m going to stand on the balcony and hope I get carried off by Russian helicopters. I hate these civilized hatchet parties.”

“Mind if I join you?” she asked.

His eyes narrowed. “What for? You’re the belle of the ball. You’ve danced every damned dance!”

“Only because you walked off and left me alone!” she threw back at him, her blue eyes flashing. “I thought we were together. But I suppose that’s carrying the line of duty too far, isn’t it? I mean, God forbid you should have to survive a whole evening in my company!”

“I said I was going outside,” he replied with exaggerated patience. “If you want to come along, fine. I don’t like being the only Indian around. Where were all these damned suicidal white
women over a hundred years ago? I’ll tell you, they were hiding behind curtains with loaded rifles! But now, all of a sudden, they can’t wait to be thrown on a horse and carried off.”

“You’re shouting,” she pointed out.

His dark eyes glittered down at her. “I am not,” he said shortly.

“Besides, you don’t have a horse.”

“I have one at home,” he replied. “Several, in fact. I like horses.”

“So do I. But I haven’t ridden much,” she replied. “There was never much time for that sort of thing.”

“People make time for the things they really want to do,” he said, looking down at her.

She shrugged. “There are plenty of places to ride around Tulsa, but I think it’s a mistake to get on a horse if you don’t know how to control it.”

“Well, well.” He stood aside to let her precede him onto the balcony, past the colorful blur of dancing couples. The balcony was dark and fairly deserted, with huge potted plants and trees and a balustrade that overlooked the brilliant lights of the city.

J
ennifer couldn’t believe he’d actually allowed her to invade his solitude without a protest. It was sheer heaven being here beside him on the balcony, without another soul in sight.

She leaned forward on the balustrade. “Isn’t it glorious?” she asked softly.

He studied her hungrily for a moment before he turned his gaze toward the horizon. “I prefer sunset on the desert.” He lit a cigarette and smoked it silently for several seconds before his dark eyes cut sideways to study her. “Did you really want to dance with me?” he asked with a faint smile. Actually he danced quite well. But having Jenny close was a big risk. She went to his head even when they were several feet apart.

“Wasn’t it obvious that I did?” she asked ruefully.

“Not to me.” He blew out a cloud of smoke and stared at the distant horizon. “I won’t dance, Jennifer. Not this kind of dancing, anyway.” He was careful to say
won’t
and not
can’t
—lying was almost impossible for him. Apaches considered it bad manners to lie.

“Oh. I’m sorry. You do everything else so well, I just assumed that dancing would come naturally to you.”

“It doesn’t,” he replied. “Where did you learn?”

“Dancing class,” she said, grinning. Odd how comfortable she felt with him, despite the feverish excitement his closeness engendered in her slender body. She could catch the scent of his cologne, and it was spicy and sexy in her nostrils. He was the stuff dreams were made of. Her dreams, anyway.

“You studied ballroom dancing?” he persisted.

“Tap and ballet, actually. My mother thought I should be well-rounded instead of walking around with my nose stuck in a book or studying rocks most of the time.”

“What are your parents like?” he asked, curious.

She smiled, picturing them. “My mother looks like me. My father’s tall and very dark. They’re both educators and I think they’re nice people. Certainly they’re intelligent.”

“They’d have to be, with such a brainy daughter.”

She laughed self-consciously. “I’m not brainy really. I had to study pretty hard to get where I am.” She smiled wistfully.

“You know your job,” he replied, glancing down at her. “I learned more about molybdenum than I wanted to know.”

She blushed. “Yes, well, I tend to ramble sometimes.”

“It wasn’t a criticism,” he said. “I enjoyed it.” He looked out over the horizon. “God, I hate society.”

“I guess it gets difficult for you when people start making insulting remarks about your heritage,” she said. “It’s hard for me when I get dragged on the dance floor by men I don’t even know. I don’t particularly like being handled.”

He frowned. He hadn’t thought of her beauty as being a handicap. Maybe it was. She’d had enough partners tonight. Enough, in fact, to make him jealous for the first time in memory.

“I don’t like being an oddity,” he agreed. “I’ve never thought of you that way.”

She smiled. “Thank you. I could return the compliment.”

He turned away from her, leaning against the balcony to look out at the city lights. “I suppose I’m less easily offended than I was before you joined the company. Maybe I’m learning to take that chip off my shoulder,” he added, glancing at her with a rueful smile. “Isn’t that what you once accused me of having?”

She joined him by the balcony, leaning her arms on it. “Yes. It was true. You got your back up every time I made a remark.”

“You intimidated me,” he said surprisingly. He lifted the cigarette to his firm lips, glancing down at her. “Beautiful, blond, intelligent…the kind of woman who could have any man she wanted. I didn’t think a reservation Indian would appeal to you.”

“I suppose you got the shock of your life that night by the creek,” she remarked, a little shy at the admission.

“Indeed I did,” he said huskily. His eyes darkened. “I never dreamed you wanted me like that.”

“It wasn’t enough, though,” she said sadly, her eyes moving to the dark landscape. “Wanting on one side, I mean.” She pushed back a loose strand of blond hair that had escaped her elegant upswept coiffure. “You didn’t smoke while we were camping out.”

“You didn’t see me,” he corrected. “It’s my only vice, and just an occasional one. I have the infrequent can of beer, but I don’t drink.” His eyes narrowed. “Alcoholism is a big problem among my people. Some scientists have ventured the opinion that Indians lack the enzyme necessary to process alcohol.”

“I didn’t know. I don’t drink, either. I like being in control of my senses.”

“Do you?” He looked down at her quietly.

She wouldn’t meet his eyes. “I always have been. Except with you.”

He sighed angrily, lifting the cigarette to his mouth again before he ground it out under his heel. “So I noticed,” he said gruffly. Her nearness was making him uncomfortable. He didn’t like the temptation of being close to her, but he didn’t want to spoil the evening for her by saying so.

She moved a little closer so that she could see his lean, dark face in the light from the ballroom. “Hunter, what’s wrong?” she asked softly.

He hated the tenderness in her voice. It tempted him and made him angry. “Nothing.”

She wanted to pursue the subject, but his expression was daunting. She smoothed down the soft material of the dress. With its sleeveless bodice that dipped almost to her waist, and the clingy chiffon outlining her narrow waist and full hips, she was a vision. She knew she looked pretty, but it would have made her evening to hear Hunter say so. Not that he would. She glanced back toward the dancers inside. “I guess this is familiar territory to you,” she murmured absently. “High society, I mean.”

He frowned. “I beg your pardon?”

“Well, you do a lot of work for Eugene, and this is his milieu,” she explained, glancing up at him. “And I know you’ve had to look after politicians for him, so I suppose it entails a certain amount of socializing.”

“Not that much.” He folded his arms over his chest. “I don’t care for this kind of civilized warfare. Too many people. Too much noise.”

“I know how you feel.” She sighed, staring toward the ballroom. “I’d much rather be outdoors, away from crowds.”

He studied her with renewed interest. She wasn’t lying. He remembered her delight in the desert those days they’d spent together, her laughter at the antics of the birds, her quiet contemplation of dusk and dawn. That pleasure hadn’t been faked. But with her beauty and education, surely this was her scene.

“You look at home here, nevertheless,” he said. He lit another cigarette and blew out a cloud of smoke. She was making him more nervous by the minute. Her dress was pure witchcraft.

“That’s funny,” she murmured, and smiled. “The closest to this kind of thing I ever got in my youth was the high school prom—or it would have been, if I’d been asked. I spent that night at home, baby-sitting the neighbor’s little boy.”

The cigarette froze en route to his mouth. “You weren’t asked?”

“You sound surprised.” She turned to look up at him. “All the boys assumed that I already had a date, because I was pretty. There was one special boy I liked, but he was just ordinary and not handsome at all. He didn’t think he had a chance with me, so he never asked me out. I didn’t find out until I was grown and he was married that he’d had a crush on me.” She laughed, but it had a hollow sound. “Women hate me because they think I’m a threat to them. Men don’t take me seriously at work if they don’t know me because pretty blondes aren’t supposed to be intelligent. And if I’m asked out on a date, it’s automatically expected that I’ll be dynamite in bed. You mentioned once that I don’t date anybody. Now you know why.”

“Are you?” he asked.

Her eyebrows lifted. “Am I what?”

“Dynamite in bed.”

She glared up at him. There was something like amusement in his tone. “Don’t you start, Hunter.”

He tossed the cigarette down and ground it out under the heel of his dress shoe, but his eyes didn’t leave hers. “Why not?” he asked, moving closer with a slow sensual step that made her heart beat faster. “I’m human.”

“Are you, really?” she asked, remembering that night on the desert when he’d seen her bathing. She almost groaned. His restraint had overwhelmed her, then and since.

He caught her hands and slid them up around his neck. “Stop dithering and dance with me,” he said quietly.

His voice was an octave lower. Deep, slow, sensuous, like the hands that, instead of holding her correctly, slid around her, against her bare back where the low cut of the dress left it vulnerable.

She gasped. “You said…you didn’t dance,” she whispered.

“You can teach me,” he whispered back.

But it didn’t feel as if he needed any instruction. He moved gracefully to the music, drawing her along with him. The feel of him this close, the brush of his warm, rough hands against her silky skin, made her tremble. When he felt the trembling, he drew her even closer. She shivered helplessly, feeling his hands slowly caressing her, his lips in her hair, against her forehead, as he made a lazy effort to move her to the rhythm of the slow bluesy tune the orchestra was playing. But it wasn’t as much dancing as it was making love to music. She felt his chest dragging against her breasts with every step, his long, powerful legs brushing against hers at the thigh. She remembered his eyes on her bare breasts, his arms around her, the feel of his hard mouth. And she ached for him.

She tried to move back, before she gave herself away, but his hands were firm.

“What are you afraid of?” he asked at her forehead.

“You,” she moaned. “What you make me feel.” Her hands grasped the lapels of his jacket. Twenty-seven years of denial, of longing, of loneliness. Years of loving this man alone, of being deprived of even the most innocent physical contact. And now she was in his arms, he was holding her, touching her, and she couldn’t hide her pleasure or her need.

“Jenny.” He bent closer, his mouth tempting hers into lifting, his eyes dark and quiet and intent in the stillness. He stopped dancing, but his hands smoothed lazily up and down her back, and he watched the rapt, anguished need color her face, part her lips. She looked as if she’d die to have him make love to her. It was the same look he remembered from the night he’d seen her bathing, and it had the same overwhelming effect on him.

“Please,” she whispered, and her voice broke. She was beyond hiding it, beyond pretence, totally vulnerable. “Would it kill you to kiss me again, just once? Oh, Hunter, please…!”

He lifted his head with a rough sigh, looking around them. He eased her into a small alcove, hidden to the rest of the balcony, and slowly moved her until she was against the wall. His hands rested on either side of her head against it, his body shielding hers, and then covering hers, trapping her between it and the wall in a slow, sensual movement.

“Lift your mouth to mine,” he whispered.

She did, without a single protest, and had it taken in a succession of slow, brief, tormenting bites. She whimpered helplessly, shaking all over with the need to be close to him. He tasted of cigarette smoke and expensive brandy, and the kiss was almost like a narcotic, drugging her with slow, aching pleasure. She clung to him with something akin to desperation, so out of control that she couldn’t begin to hide what she was feeling. Her body throbbed
with it, trembled with it. Twenty-seven years of denial were going up in flames, in his arms.

“My God, you’re starving for me,” he said huskily, his voice rough with surprise as he looked down at her. “It’s all right, little one,” he breathed as his dark head bent again. “It’s all right. I’ll feed you…”

His mouth covered hers then, slowly building the pressure into something wild and deep and overwhelming. As if he understood her need for passion, he pushed down against her and his mouth became demanding, its very roughness filling the emptiness in her.

She slid her arms around his lean waist and pressed even closer, tears rolling down her flushed cheeks as she fed on his mouth, accepting the hard thrust of his tongue with awe, loving the feel of his aroused body bearing hers heavily against the wall. She wept against his hard lips and he lifted his head.

“Oh, don’t…stop,” she whispered brokenly. “Please, please…don’t stop yet!”

He was losing it. His mouth ground into hers again, tasting the softness of her parted lips, inhaling the exquisite fragrance of her body into his nostrils. His body was rigid with desire, his hips already thrusting helplessly against hers with an involuntary rhythm. His mouth crushed hers roughly, his teeth nipping her full lower lip in a pagan surge of fierce need.

“I want you,” she whispered into his mouth. All her control was gone, all her pride. She was beyond rational thought. “I want you. I want you so much!”

He dragged his head up. His hands gripped her upper arms hard while he fought for control. She’d already lost hers. Her eyes were dilated, wild with need, her body shaking helplessly with it. She was his. Here, now, standing up, she would have welcomed him
and he knew it. It was all he could do to back away. But he had to remember who they were, and where they were.

“Jennifer,” he said quietly. His voice sounded strained. He fought to steady it. “Jennifer!” He shook her. “Stop it!”

She felt the rough shake as if it was happening to somebody else. She stared up at him through a sensual veil, still shivering, her body throbbing with its urgent need of his. He shook her again, fiercely, and she caught her breath. The world spun around her and she suddenly realized where they were.

She swallowed hard with returning sanity. Her face went scarlet when she remembered begging him…

His hands tightened and released her arms. “Come on, now,” he said, his voice gentle where it had been violent. “Come on, Jenny. Take a deep breath.”

He knew she was vulnerable. He knew it all now. Tears ran down her cheeks, hot and salty, into the corners of her swollen mouth.

He drew her head to his jacket, his hands soothing at her nape. “It’s all right, little one,” he said quietly, his teeth clenched as he fought his own physical demons. He was hurting. “It’s all right. Nothing happened.”