Indigo Blue (42 page)

“It hurts,” she cried.

Jake clenched his teeth, in an agony of regret because he was bringing her pain, and guilt because, even though he knew he was hurting her, he didn’t want to stop. Being inside her felt more wonderful than anything he had ever experienced. Her body sheathed him so tightly. That alone could have pushed him over the edge.

“Oh, God, Indigo, I’m sorry.”

Unable to hold back, he moved his hips. She gasped and held her breath. Loath to hurt her, Jake forced himself to go still again. While he lay there embracing her, trying to soothe her, the building pressure inside him exploded, and he spent himself like a randy youth with his first woman. He squeezed his eyes closed and quivered, letting it come since he didn’t have a hell of a lot to say about it.

Indigo gasped again as his heat flooded through her. With a little sigh, she whispered, “Oh my . . .” He felt the tension drain out of her. Then, like a novice drummer marching to her own beat, completely oblivious to the fact that she was out of step with the rest of the band, she undulated her hips.

Jake didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. His body felt like a wet, wrung-out rag, and now she was responding? On arms that quivered with weakness, he suspended himself above her, determined to come through for her if it killed him. Which it might, he decided. His heart was slamming like a sledge.

In the moonlight, he could see the silver tracks of her tears on her cheeks. She lifted a luminous gaze to his. An incredulous, glowing little smile touched her lips. She raised her hips in artless, awkward abandon, a little off center, and without the force that he knew would bring her pleasure. But even so, the muscles in her face tightened. With a joyous moan, she retreated, then bumped against him again.

“Oh, Jake,” she whispered. “I love you. Oh, yes . . .”

Jake’s thoughts were more along the line of “Oh, no . . .” But then every man had at least one miracle coming to him in his lifetime, and while watching his innocent little wife discover the pleasures of lovemaking, Jake finally got his. Unbelievably, incredibly, he felt another flash of fire course through his loins. Still trembling from one release, he felt the pressure of another begin to build. Carefully, he moved forward to meet the clumsy little thrusts of Indigo’s slender hips, letting her set the pace, filled with an aching pleasure at the sound of her shaky little moans and shrill cries as she experienced her first jolts of ecstasy.

Then passion pulled him into the vortex with her. He took over and set a more masterful rhythm, one which he knew would bring her far more pleasure. He nearly grinned when she bent her knees and clasped his hips between her thighs to better absorb the impact. She was so infinitely precious, so completely without guile. He wanted this to be beautiful for her.

Suddenly, she arched and stiffened. Jake’s body responded with a primal ferocity. As his second climax in less than four minutes rocked over him, he had two surprisingly rational thoughts. One was that he had to be breaking some kind of world record—not that anyone documented phenomena of this sort. The second was a little more profound.

After a lifetime of not being entirely certain, he was now absolutely positive there was such a place as heaven. It wasn’t in California, as he had believed years ago, and contrary to popular opinion, a man didn’t have to die to get there. Heaven was right here on earth . . . in Indigo’s arms.

DAWN STREAKED THE LEADEN SKY WITH wisps of light, touching the bedroom with a rosy glow. From behind his closed eyelids, Jake saw the pinkness and wondered if he had died and gone to heaven after all. He felt Indigo’s bare breasts against his chest and her slender thigh clasped between his. If this wasn’t heaven, he didn’t know what was.

As lightly as butterfly wings, he felt her fingertips tracing the lines of his face and realized what had woken him. He was being explored. He resisted the temptation to open his eyes. If she realized he was awake, she’d probably turn shy.

She touched his nose, following the ridge with a timid fingertip. Then she explored his mouth, his ear, the texture of his hair. When she drew back and skimmed her palms over his chest, he nearly smiled. The male nipple was obviously a curiosity. Tenderness welled within him when she toyed with it, as he had hers, trying to elicit the same response. She captured the peak and rolled it between her fingers. He lifted his lashes slightly. Her huge eyes were filled with childlike wonder.

Evidently bored by his unresponsive nipple, she checked out his chest hair and then prodded the pads of muscle. Next she walked her fingertips down his rib cage. Jake’s breath caught when she followed the line of hair on his belly to its destination. A tiny frown puckered her delicate brows when she curled her hand around his limp manhood. She gave it a tentative little squeeze. Her frown deepened. She traced the crown.

Mistaking the tantalizing touches of female fingertips as a call to muster, his flaccid appendage came to rigid attention. She went still, gazing down at the swollen rod she found herself holding. Her eyes widened, and she jerked her hand back as if it burned her. Her startled gaze flew to his.

The game was up. . . . Jake cracked a smile. “Are you looking for trouble, Mrs. Rand? If so, you just found it.”

Crimson flooded her face, and she started to scoot away. He caught her around the waist. “Where are you off to so fast? I was hoping it was my turn next.”

Her face flushed a deeper red. “You’re awake.”

Wide awake, Jake realized, the victim of an unintentional seduction. He drew his other arm from under the pillow and mimicked her, tracing the lines of her face and feigning curious awe. He slowly worked toward her chest and explored her nipple.

“What do we have here?” he asked in a husky voice. “Interesting, very interesting. Do they have a specific use, or are they just for pretty?”

Her eyes darkened and turned turbulent when he captured a hard little peak and lightly pinched it. Jake slid his palm under her breast and lifted it. Bending his head, he tasted with the tip of his tongue.

“It’s delicious. Do you mind if I have a nibble or two or three?”

Her lips parted and she expelled a soft little sigh.

Jake lay back and grinned. “Selfish with them, are you?”

A heated languor entered her eyes, and her lashes drooped. She leaned forward to put her breast more fully in his hand. He cupped it with his palm and rubbed his thumb over her areola.

“Well? Cat got your tongue?”

“Yes,” she breathed in belated response.

“Yes, what? You’re selfish with them?”

“No. You can nibble all you like.”

Tightening his arm at her waist, he lifted her slightly, then drew her toward him. When her breast was within an inch of his mouth, he released her. Gazing up into her passion-dark eyes, he whispered, “Last night, I had to take. Will you make a gift to me now?”

Her gaze dropped to his mouth. She swallowed and pressed closer. When he did nothing, she moaned low in her throat. A shy blush stole over her cheeks again as she touched her nipple to his lips. With an unprecedented tenderness, he drew her into his mouth and watched the expressions that flitted across her face as he suckled her.

She was, without question, the sweetest, most precious gift he had ever received.

 

It was half past nine, Jake hadn’t left for the mine, his wife was still asleep, and he hadn’t had breakfast. But did he care? Hell, no. Jake sat on the edge of the bed and braced an arm on the other side of her.

“I have to go, you little hellcat,” he whispered. “Since I kept you awake all night, would you like to stay home today?”

“Mm . . .”

“Be waiting for me?”

Her kiss-swollen mouth curved in a dreamy smile. Without opening her eyes, she murmured, “I’ll throw away the rock, I promise.”

Jake nuzzled her neck. “What is it, anyway? A Comanche charm of some kind?”

She snuggled deeper under the down quilt. “No, a remedy,” she replied groggily. “So I’d take.”

With his lips hovering below her ear, he grew still. “Take?”

“Mm . . . with a baby.” Her smile deepened. “So you wouldn’t pester me.”

Now that Jake thought about it, he remembered hearing once that a rock placed under a husband’s side of the mattress might expedite conception, the idea being that the less a man slept, the more frequently he would make love to his wife. Somehow, he didn’t think that result had been Indigo’s goal, and he chuckled. “Damn, don’t just throw the thing away. Bury it.” He nibbled his way to her mouth. “Not that I’m against making babies. We can start work on that tonight.”

“Tonight,” she agreed drowsily.

“Let’s aim to have a dozen,” he said with a grin. “A hundred tries each. If I haven’t run out of steam by then, you can dig your rock back up.”

“Mm . . . a dozen, yes.”

Jake kissed her goodbye, then rose to gaze down at her for a moment. God, he loved her. He wondered if she had any idea how much. He gave Sonny a farewell scratch between his ears, then slid his gaze to the window. Last night, for the first time since Lobo’s death, Indigo had forgotten to open it.

 

Later that morning, when Indigo finally came awake, she heated a basin of water so she could wash. After dressing, she collected her ruined chemise and Jake’s jeans, then headed for the creek for their other smelly clothing. Minutes later, she had a small bonfire going. As she tossed the garments into the flames, she was swept back in time to a night six years ago when she had burned all her white clothing and vowed to never again acknowledge her white blood. Lying in Jake’s arms had erased all that pain from her heart. She felt whole again, and healed.

A smile touched her mouth as she recalled the first time she had set eyes on Jake. If someone had told her then that less than a month later he would get on his knees to her and kiss her feet, she would have bent double with laughter. Now that it had happened, though, she wasn’t laughing. To think that Jake, of all the men she knew, had done that, and for her? It brought tears to her eyes.

She tossed her bloomers on the fire and took a deep breath. It was odd when she thought about it. For so long, she had clung desperately to what little pride Brandon had left her. Then, with only a few words, Jake had stripped her of even that. Yet now she felt glorified. It was as if he had emptied her of the ugliness, then filled her back up with only good things.

Smoke drifted into Indigo’s eyes. She squinted and hugged herself, enjoying the heat. Laurel, which was far scarcer than pine and more difficult to cut, was a hard wood that put forth a slow, hot, long-lasting fire. Like Jake’s love, she thought. His wasn’t the kind to burn hot and fast, then fizzle out.

In spite of her discomfort from lovemaking, Indigo attacked the housework with gusto when she went back indoors. Though perhaps only temporary, this little house was Jake’s home, and she wanted it to be more than just tidy. When he came in from work in the evenings, he would be able to tell just by looking how much she loved him and how proud she was to be his wife.

After changing the bed linen, Indigo decided today would be a perfect time to do some deep cleaning, symbolic of the fresh start she and Jake had made last night. She hauled all the rugs outside and beat them with the broom. Then, before sweeping, she decided to clean the ashes from the cookstove and fireplace. She finished in the kitchen first, then moved to the sitting room. Kneeling on the hearth, she leaned forward over her knees to scoop the ashes and soot.

At the back of the inner hearth lay the burned remnants of a piece of paper. Indigo would have discarded it if her gaze hadn’t caught on the partially charred letterhead. A prickle of uneasiness crawled up the back of her neck. Ore-Cal Enterprises? Her gaze lowered to the unburned portions of the letter, written in a distinct, masculine scrawl.

Indigo started to shake. She stared down at the letter and willed it to disappear. When that didn’t work, she reread it and prayed it wouldn’t seem quite so incriminating the second time. Jake was somehow connected to Ore-Cal Enterprises? What dirty work was Jeremy referring to? And who was Em?

Oh, God. . . .

Indigo clamped a hand over her mouth. Lies, all lies. Everything he had ever told her about himself had been a lie. She knew what dirty work Jeremy was referring to, the sabotage of the mine. Of course! What perfect sense that made. If they could put her father into a serious financial bind, he would sell out at a low price to Ore-Cal.

It all fell together for Indigo like the scattered pieces of a puzzle. Jake’s arrival on the same day that they had expected the representative from Ore-Cal. The lack of calluses on his palms. Even his reluctance to have her at the mine now took on new significance. He wouldn’t want her there any more than he could help for fear she might hinder him in his plans.