Kary, Elizabeth (38 page)

Valiantly,
she tried to quiet the jarring of her heart and think what surrender might
mean. But her thoughts were mired in pleasure, and her body craved to know
more. She wanted to learn the things Hayes could teach her, to seek passion in
his arms, to explore the wonders of loving with a man who could show her the
way.

Her
willingness remained unspoken, but Hayes taught her with kisses and touches and
breathless words the scope and the meaning of bliss. She learned how a man's
hands could move on a woman's body, gentle and strong and sure; about the pain
and pleasure a woman could feel, clothed in the guise of delight; about a world
of wants and needs that she had never known; about giving the gift of
tenderness and receiving unstinting returns. Then his mouth moved lower still,
nudging her legs apart, and pressed to her wondrous budding core, Hayes taught
her the end to it all.

Like
an arrow streaking into the sky, she was flying fast and free—higher, stronger,
swifter, farther than she had ever flown before. Fear raced along her nerves
before reality fell away, and then there was only Hayes holding her as she
blossomed with exultant joy. The world seemed to expand before her as she
surged higher than before, stretching, pushing, seeking, reaching for something
elusive and pure. Rapture welled over her suddenly: like sunlight beyond the
clouds, like Stardust in her veins, like the fantasies of love she had held in
her heart made real. And for a shining, silvered moment she hung lost in
boundless ecstasy.

Hayes
rode the waves of sensation with her, sought her joy as if it were his own,
showed her the reaches of passion, helped her define and achieve delight. And
when the storm was over, he held her tenderly, celebrating her fulfillment as
something they had shared. Her initiation into the rites of love had been as
fulfilling to him the guide as to her the novice, and at that moment he wanted
nothing more than to claim her as his forever.

They
lay entwined together, a rope of tangled limbs, stroking, sleeping, touching,
kissing in the light of the setting moon. By that slow, cool, mellowing glow,
Leigh raised her head to look at Hayes. He was. as she had always known him to
be, a strong and beautiful man: generous, selfless, and gentle. But there was
more to Hayes tonight, and she was seeing him anew. His was an arresting face,
the features vivid and almost harsh: a broad, intelligent brow; a
narrow-bridged nose; a hard, square jaw; and a mouth that for all its
determination was sensuously curved and vulnerable.

Then,
drawn by forces she did not understand, she marked the long, deep, masculine
dimples with her thumbs, cradled his jaw in the curve of her cupped palms. But
even as she touched him, the need for greater contact grew, and her hands slid
lower still to explore the column of his throat and the half-moon hollow at its
base. She liked the suppleness of his warm, smooth flesh beneath her fingers
and continued to explore him gently.

Moving
with lazy grace, Leigh curled back on her heels and traced the contours of his
body with the thoroughness of one gone blind. Her hands lingered on his
shoulders; rode the swell of his rock-hard arms; explored the smooth, bronzed
planes of his powerful chest, delineated in wondrous symmetry. Her palms moved
downward across the arch of his stomach and spanned the bridge of his hips
before they swept down the sinuous cable of muscles in his powerful thighs and
calves.

Even
as her hands moved over him, Leigh knew she should not allow herself the luxury
of exploring him so freely, yet there was a delicious, secret thrill in
touching his perfect physique. She reveled in the masculine regularity of his
form, in his power and latent strength. And it was impossible, after all the
ruined men she'd seen and comforted, not to celebrate Hayes's wholeness as he
lay rugged and hard before her. She wanted to remember him just as he was,
rangy and virile and strong, learning him with touch as well as sight, so that
when the war claimed its price from others, she could know how they once must
have been.

As
her hands lingered on his skin, a slow, sweet hunger was budding in her loins,
a growing, seeping, aching need that only Hayes could satisfy. It moved beneath
her skin, a subtle, undeniable glow, creeping through her body like dawn across
the sky.

Hayes
sensed the growing ardor in her touch and saw it in her eyes, but it was
tempered with some desperate, private sadness he sought to understand and
rectify.

"Leigh?"
Her name was an endearment, rumbling deep within his chest. It was a question,
an invitation, a demand that Leigh could not ignore.

Slowly
she raised her eyes to his and was caught in their glittering depths. Their
cold, clear shade of blue was warmed tonight, silvered by the moon, and they
held Leigh helplessly mesmerized so she could not turn away. Stretching back
along his length, she answered his query with a kiss, letting the flavor of his
mouth seep slowly into hers.

That
single kiss grew tenfold, then ten times ten times ten. They crowded to the
corners of the mouth and eyes, fell carelessly on chins and hair, spun in
skeins of delight along their bodies, and pooled upon their skin. Those kisses
were feather soft and light, were slick and wet and warm; they clotted with
growing passionate need, subsided then swelled again.

Their
bodies tangled as they kissed, and still kissing became one. They turned and
twisted tenderly, each seeking for the other a wondrous gift only they could
give. Hayes's body probed the depths of hers, and Leigh's offered a welcoming
sheath: a warm, sweet haven of tenderness where a man could find release.
Clinging, kissing, arching, pressing, the fervor of their passion grew, and
together they sought the moment when their hearts would beat as one.

Then
it was upon them, the flicker of rapture, the rush of delight, the moment of
ultimate truth. It came with wanton abandon, racing like an errant wind, giving
a dazzling fulfillment that neither had ever known. A spangle of sensation
moved along their limbs as they clung with breathless need, their bodies
melding closer as they succumbed to mindless ecstasy. With a trail of shivers
it dwindled at last, waning in a gentle caress, leaving them spent and broken,
but sated and renewed.

The
sound of the deckhands stirring in the murky dawn brought Hayes awake at last,
and he found Leigh, soft and limp as a wilted flower, curling close beside him.
In the veiled half-light of approaching day, he watched her as she slept,
realizing the scope of his devotion, the extent of his need for her. He had
loved this woman before and had wanted her for his own, but never with this
sweeping intensity, this primitive desire that filled his soul with longing. He
drew her body closer still, with a vow to make Leigh forever his, to claim the
woman of his dreams for love, for life, for all eternity.

***

May 31, 1862
—
New Madrid,
Missouri

It
was the change in the incessant, dunning rhythm of the riverboat's engines that
woke Leigh, and she was immediately aware of the slight lag in the boat's
forward movement that meant they were approaching a landing. A moment later,
she heard the hails of the crew on the decks below, an answering clamor of
voices from the shore. Then came a soft, slight nudge as the
Barbara Dean
nuzzled
against the riverbank. Where were they? Leigh wondered. She scrambled to her
knees to peer out the window high above the bunk and abruptly realized the
state of her undress.

Color
flooded her cheeks, and her curiosity about their whereabouts swiftly abated as
she unwillingly recalled how she had come to be lying naked in Hayes Banister's
bunk. Appalled by what had transpired the night before, confused by what she
felt, Leigh curled up in the center of the mattress and drew the covers over
her head. Her memories of the hours between midnight and dawn were mercilessly
clear, and the icy hands she pressed to her cheeks did nothing to extinguish
the flush that swept through her.

She
had come to consciousness slowly, sensing first an enveloping warmth, then a
soft, recurring touch. As she twisted to escape it, the gentle stroke had
become goading, intrusive, demanding. Then she had realized that a virile,
dark-haired man was bending above her: a man with lips that moved like velvet on
her skin, a man with a taunting power in his caress. Her mouth already bore the
taste of his kisses, and her flesh was tingling from contact with his. The
magic that was Hayes had already begun to engulf her. Yet there had been a
brief moment of crystalline sanity when Leigh could have turned away.

Instead
her arms had made a circuit of his neck, and her mouth had opened under his. As
they kissed, a strange compulsion had seeped through her veins, a need that she
found hard to comprehend. She had wanted to explore the mysteries of her own
sensations, reaffirm the vague, half-remembered wonder of the other times they
had been together. When Hayes had offered to teach her what passion meant,
Leigh had been desperate to learn whatever secrets he was willing to share. She
had trusted Hayes with her curious, strangely pliant body, and he had, once
again, done nothing more than what she asked: he had made slow, exquisite love
to her.

Last
night she had sought that delight as fiercely as he, and today she wished she
could deny it.

Hayes
had brought her devastating, unexpected pleasure; he had helped her to
understand and fulfill her woman's needs. She was both gratified and confused
by the exultant pleasure in her own response. But however wondrous the realm of
self-discovery, however compelling the need to experience delight, last night
had been a mistake, and Leigh knew she could never succumb to Hayes's charms
again.

Her
reticence went beyond the guilt she felt at betraying Lucas Hale to the basic
beliefs she had adhered to all her life. Her mother had raised Leigh to be a
lady, and no lady engaged in the behavior Leigh had enjoyed last night, nor
would a lady entertain the thoughts that threaded through her brain this
morning. She had stepped quite a distance over the line between propriety and
licentiousness, and if she was not to lose everything, she would need to mend
her ways.

Mercifully
Hayes was not here now, but she knew that within minutes, or hours at best, she
would have to confront him. And what could she say when he stood before her?
Dear God, what would she say?

Last
night Leigh had been uninhibited and wildly responsive. Would Hayes expect the
same behavior by the light of day? Could he possibly expect to find her waiting
for his return in wanton anticipation, sprawled naked and eager across his bed?

It
had been a mistake to have allowed him carnal knowledge of her that first time
when she had been so desperately in need of comfort. But it was worse to have
accepted his caresses again. Surely whatever respect he had for her was gone
now, destroyed by her irresponsible willingness, her unbridled desire.

Once
he'd been honorable enough to offer her marriage, but he would not offer it
now. Nor did she want him to. She did not want to be bound to a man she did not
love simply because she had succumbed to the tyranny of her errant senses. Nor
could she ever enter into a marriage where passion was the only bond. She had
long been a witness to the consequence of such a union and was terrified of
building her life on something as fleeting as desire. The thing she must make
clear to Hayes when she saw him again was their need to avoid each other or at
least to avoid situations where their own weaknesses might overwhelm them.

The
first thing she must do was to explain her new resolve to Hayes, she decided.
And surely he would be more receptive to her arguments if she greeted him in
somewhat less dishabille than she was in now. That entailed washing, dressing,
and preparing herself to confront Hayes Banister when he returned. Resolutely,
Leigh got up.

Hayes
did not return to the
Barbara Dean
until the late afternoon, and by then
Leigh had rehearsed all she planned to say to him. It was the rush of response
at the sight of him that surprised her, almost as much as the warmth she saw
shining in his pale blue eyes. For a long moment they stood staring, Hayes with
his hand clenched on the door-knob and Leigh with her book lying open in her
lap.

"Good
afternoon, Leigh," he finally said. "I'm sorry I was gone so long. It
took more time than I expected to find what I was looking for here in New
Madrid."

"New
Madrid? Is that where we are?"

He
nodded and closed the door behind him, then gingerly approached her chair.
"I had something I had to take care of, something I needed to do before I
saw you again."

Inexplicable
uneasiness stirred through Leigh at the admission, and she raised her eyes to
his. "Oh?" she barely managed to answer.

"I
wanted to find a parson and make arrangements for our wedding this
evening."

For
an instant Leigh stared at him without comprehension as cold shock swept down
her arms. "Our wedding?"

Hayes
nodded, his eyes intent on her expression. "Yes, Leigh. After last night
it seemed the only decent thing to do."

Once
again he was offering her marriage for the sake of honor, but was it his honor
or her honor he meant to appease?