Outlaw Carson (2 page)

“Yeah, yeah, I know. Old Mother Hubbard
better get something for the cupboard.”

The whining stopped abruptly, and Mancos
whirled around, almost knocking her over in the process. He
barreled out of the kitchen hell-bent for leather, sliding on the
wood floor and letting out a woof that made coffee redundant.

Eyes painfully wide, Kristine shuddered and
shook her head, trying to get rid of the ringing in her ears. She
heard Mancos hit the dog-door at full speed, followed in the next
second by a loud, deep, “Aaiieey-yah!”

“Dammit, Bob,” she muttered, slamming the
refrigerator door shut and stumbling after the mastiff. She ran
through the living room, threw back the curtains, and jerked the
atrium door open—to the most amazing sight.

He was fast, she had to give him that, and
light of foot, like a highwire artist. And he definitely wasn’t
Bob. He was racing along the deck railing, keeping either one step
in front of or one step behind Mancos’s snapping jaws. The morning
light spilling over the foothills cast him in a golden halo, a
color shades paler than the thick, silky hair pulled away from his
face and hanging in a roan braid down his back. Shorter strands of
dark auburn hair feathered across his cheeks and melded into the
winged curves of his brows.

The sleeves of his black tunic were rolled
up, revealing dark skin, tightly corded muscle, and more gold
bracelets than she could count. A wide leather belt hung low on his
hips, banded on one side with the hilt and sheath of a large,
wickedly curved
khukri
, the blade of a Gurkha mercenary.
His jeans were tucked into roughly made short boots, nothing more
than flaps of leather sewn together with strips of rawhide that
were secured with silver hoops at the top. He was a running wind
chime, and the music of his quick steps left her stunned.

She really needed to do something to save
him, she thought, or her dog, if he went for his knife. Then he saw
her, and his flashing grin and sly wink made her instantly aware of
a need to save herself.

She stepped backward with a hand to her
chest, a blatant gesture of self-defense, and a totally
inappropriate action for a contemporary woman living in an age when
the only raiding hordes inhabited Wall Street. But the uncivilized
look of him conjured up undeniable visions of a long-ago time, when
women were women and men were the barbarians who took them.

Barbarian
. . . Between one breath
and the next she placed him, that damn barbarian, Kit Carson.

“
Kukur, ahA
!” he shouted in a deep
voice, watching the dog, but tossing her the chamois bag slung over
his shoulder. When Mancos went for the bag, he clapped his hands
and shouted again, recapturing the mastiff’s attention. “Hey,
dog!”

Kristine caught the heavy bag and clutched
it closely, not daring to take her eyes off Carson or the animal so
determined to eat him for breakfast. He wasn’t afraid of the
slavering, growling beast. The realization went through her with
absolute certainty and wavering disbelief. Mancos’s looks alone
kept most visitors in their cars, honking their horns. But then he
wasn’t most men. He was the outlaw Carson, and she’d bet anything
he was no Buddhist monk. Not with that smile.

The dog lunged for his ankle, and Kristine’s
fingers tightened around the strap of the bag. The melange of soft
textures drew her gaze—the strap was made of silk and the finest
leather, and a yard-long auburn braid that matched the color of his
hair. Her jaw slackened as she raised her head to stare at him
again.

He was pacing the rail now, not running, and
Mancos matched him step for step, back and forth across the deck.
He was talking to the dog, and the singsong lilt underlying the
rough timbre of his voice mingled with the fresh, light sound of
his bracelets, mesmerizing the dog and her both. When he hunkered
down on the rail, she felt sure Mancos would snap out of it, but he
didn’t. Neither did she. The man reached down to scratch behind one
of the dog’s rusty-brown ears, and she almost dropped his bag in
shock. Then, with seemingly no effort, he stepped off the rail. He
didn’t jump or leap. He just stepped, an act of power and grace
that told her more about the muscles in his legs than any amount of
running on the narrow rail. And he wasn’t even breathing hard.

She wasn’t breathing, period.

“
Namaste
,” he greeted her.
Bracelets, beaten gold and chased in ancient designs, jangled as he
touched his palms together. “Good morning.”

“Hi,” she said, but it came out more like
the breath she’d lost than a word. Six feet of masculine brawn
towered over her, gentled only by the teasing light in his eyes.
The sheer size of him was overwhelming, and it was compounded by
the energy she felt radiating off him. Renegade, outlaw, or monk,
the man had presence in spades.

Kit grinned at the stunned woman. Finally,
he mused, the long journey seemed worthwhile. He’d tracked his
trunks across the breadth of America, from one fleeting destination
to the next, until they’d led him here, to a house and a woman. His
fainthearted partners had more than compensated for their
irresponsible treatment of the trunks.

He took in her dishabille and the amazement
in her eyes, and his smile broadened. If she’d been less beautiful,
he would have been too tired. A wild cloud of dark curls tumbled
past her shoulders, framing a face of untold delicacy; eyes of a
color he’d never imagined, like mountain violets, and the palest
skin he’d ever seen, skin delightfully unmarred by the heavy makeup
that covered the faces of so many Western women.

“Concubine?” he asked, running his finger
along her cheek. She was so soft, so beautiful, so welcome, he
sighed. Yes, Shepard and Stein had done well. He graciously forgave
them for their cowardice and merely doubled the price of the
treasures he’d risked his life to bring them.

Con . . . cu . . . bine, concu-bine,
con-cubine
. Kristine tried to untangle the word from his
accent. When she did, her face flamed, especially where he’d
touched her.

“No,” she gasped, then put more force into
the word. “No. I am not a concubine.”

“Not mine?” One eyebrow lifted over
spice-colored eyes, spice like cinnamon, dark, rich, and
mysterious.

“No. No. Not yours.”

“Too bad, eh?” His grin flashed again, more
dangerous than before.

Yes
. The word formed in her mind,
and she chased it out on rapidly beating wings of panic. “I am . .
.” She took a deep breath and tried again. “I am Kristine, Kristine
Richards.”

“Kreestine, Kreestine?” he repeated, smiling
again to ease her discomfort. Kristine felt anything but eased by
the inherently sensuous curve of his mouth and the glimpse of
strong, white teeth. Sensuality, she’d learned the hard way, was a
thing to be avoided at all costs.

“No, just one Kristine,” she explained when
she found her voice again.

“Ah, Kreestine,” He rolled her name off his
tongue, putting a lilt on the second syllable. “Very pretty.”

“It’s a—a nice enough name.” she stammered,
wondering when her brain was going to kick back in.

“No.” He slowly shook his head and his grin
faded. Capturing her chin with a large, rough hand, he tilted her
head back, immobilizing her with the gentleness of his touch and
the light in his eyes. “Kreestine is pretty,” he murmured, his
mouth lowering to hers, his breath warming her lips.

A flood of heat poured down her body at the
slight touch. When he sealed his mouth over hers, her last shred of
sanity followed. She melted as a masterfully strong arm wrapped
around her waist and pulled her close, close enough to feel every
curve of muscle in his chest and the tautness of his abdomen; close
enough to feel the rising tide of his desire and his iron-hard
thighs.

Good Lord, she thought through a haze of
faintness. His tongue asked for and gained purchase into the
recesses of her mouth. He tasted sweet, musky sweet, like honey
from a faraway land, and he kissed with an abandon to match the
wild flavor, completely, exotically.

Ravished
. The indescribable feeling
spread through her mind as the moment slipped deeper into fantasy,
further from reality. She was being ravished and she really needed
to stop it before she decided she liked it.

More than beautiful, more than tantalizing,
Kit discovered so much in her kiss. His first instant of
astonishment slowly transformed into curiosity, then into
exploration. With the patience of the ages he began to learn the
pleasure she gave. He followed the path dawning in his mind as he
deepened the kiss, drawing her ever closer, the way he was being
drawn.

Ah, she should have been a concubine, he
thought, but even as a simple keeper of his hearth she was more
pleasing than any other. He’d been right to come to this unseen
land of his mother and father. He’d been no monk. No amount of
beating had changed the truth that the life of aesthetic riches had
not been for him. He’d been meant to live this life with all its
joys and pain.

Drawing on her strength for what she knew
was her one and only chance, Kristine pushed against his chest.
Where was Mancos when she needed him?

“Aaiieyah,” he whispered softly into her
mouth, helping her push away.

She looked up dazedly at the pained
expression on his face. Goodness sakes! Had she hurt him?

Hurt him? What was she thinking? She should
have slapped his face.

“The dog likes you better than me?” he
asked.

She followed his gaze down the length of his
body to where Mancos’s huge jaws were wrapped around a mouthful of
jeans and undoubtedly the leg beneath. No sound emanated from the
jowly animal, a good sign.

“M-Mancos, shoo, shoo.” She flicked the tail
end of her robe at him, grateful for the distraction and the chance
to catch her breath. What in the world had she been thinking, to
sink against him like some sunstruck coed?

“Sha, sha?” she heard him repeat above her
head.

“Shoo . . . uu,” she instinctively corrected
him, then wondered if she’d lost her mind.

“Sha-sha, Mancos. Sha-sha.” He raised his
foot and shook it the slightest bit. “Sha-sha.” The dog did, but
only a little. The ugliest head on the continent lifted just far
enough to shove into the man’s crotch. He laughed, a deep, rolling
sound that seemed to wash all through Kristine. And then he
embarrassed her beyond the ends of the earth. “Not for you,
Mancos.” He pushed the dog away. “For Kreestine.”

She figured her only glimmer of hope lay in
the heretofore unheard of possibility of spontaneous disappearance.
Of course, it didn’t happen. Her luck hadn’t been running in the
right direction for miracles lately.

Or had it? Her own laughter rose in her
throat, but she couldn’t tell if it was a mature response to his or
the beginnings of hysteria. He took the opportunity to steal a kiss
off her cheek, his head bending close to hers, his braid sliding
over his shoulder, and she knew it was hysteria she fought.

“
Namaste
, Kreestine,” he
murmured.

“
N-namaste
. . .” She knew who he
was, knew the only person he could be, but she still didn’t believe
it.

“Kautilya Carson,” he said, filling in the
blank left by her trailing voice.

“Kit Carson?” she questioned breathlessly,
having never heard the other name.

“Westerners say Keet, yes.”

“The Buddhist monk?” she asked, attempting
to clear up one of the obviously more doubtful rumors she’d heard
about him.

“No. I am not a monk.” He laughed and
touched her cheek again, as if she needed reminding of the kiss
they’d shared. “I ran away before they gelded me.”

“They geld the monks?” She hadn’t read
anything about gelding in her comparative religion textbooks.

“They try, in the mind,” he explained. “But
some like boys.”

And she certainly hadn’t read that in any
textbook.

“Don’t worry.” He laughed again. “They
didn’t get me. You taste like coffee. Do you have coffee?”

She absolutely did not believe this. She
didn’t believe any of it. He tasted of honey, and she tasted like
coffee. They’d barely met and all they’d talked about and attempted
was sex, an occurrence so rare in her life and so far back in her
past, she’d completely forgotten what all the fuss was about until
he’d reminded her. Oh brother, had he reminded her. She needed to
go back to bed and give the morning another shot at normalcy.

“Yes,” she blurted out in panic, realizing
bed was the last place she dared to go. “Yes, I have coffee.”

“Good.” He reached for the bag dangling from
her hand and slung it over his shoulder. “Let’s share coffee.”

In the five feet stretching from where she’d
stood on the deck to the front door, she managed to stumble over
thin air.

“Careful, Kreestine.” He laughed and reached
out to steady her. The warmth of his hand only flustered her more.
“Did you hurt yourself?”

“No. No, I’m not hurt.” She really needed to
stop repeating herself, she thought. Then she ran into something
substantially harder than thin air, the huge duffel bag he’d
dropped on her deck.

“My fault.”

He grinned, and that, she knew, was
something he really needed to stop doing, if she was going to get
her pulse slowed to a reasonable pace. He bent down and picked up
the duffel bag, slung it over his shoulder, then hefted a large
trunk onto his other shoulder, a trunk to match the six already
piled in her living room.

If she hadn’t seen it with her own eyes, she
wouldn’t have believed it. Even with a ton of luggage weighing him
down, he moved with more grace than she could have imagined, as if
his feet weren’t touching the ground.