With One Look (21 page)

His hands slipped under her arms, coaxing her back until he was presented with her breasts.

She cried softly as he

drew on one rosy tip, laving it with his tongue, listening avidly to her cries as a pink flush spread over her form.

The world was made of a swirl of water and searching lips. Nails dug into the hard muscled back as rushes of warmth gathered tighter and tighter until she felt like she would burst, only to tense more as he lifted her higher. She was suddenly clinging to his neck, her legs wrapped tightly around him as she felt water rush into her warmth as his shaft moved back and forth. Burning sensations licked through her abdomen, gathering into a hot swell that made her cry helplessly for him, his help, his answer.

He slipped long and hard into her moist sheath. He stopped and closed his eyes as the hot tight pleasure spilled into him. Then, moving with deliberate slowness, he lifted her from him, slid almost all the way out before plunging back hard.

There was a wild, untamed carnal element to the mating, coming less from the surrounding wilderness and more from the unleashing of desire, a momentum of hot sensations climbing and climbing, intensifying and reflected by her cries. Her fingers dug into his back as his desire soared to a harder and faster pace until he felt the slender form stiffen and she clung to him as ripples of triumphant pleasure washed through her. He made a last stabbing thrust into her, the intensity of his release rocking violently through him....

He was kissing her mouth as he held her to him, their hearts beating erratically as they spiraled slowly downward together. "Don't let me go," she whispered, frightened by the intensity of his lovemaking as she felt the shuddering echoes of the aftermath. She needed to feel his arms more than she needed her next breath.

"Never," he said, his voice curiously subdued and humbled by the force of this thing overcoming them, overwhelming him. Love. He did not want it and for the first time in his life he felt as if an act of will could not stop it. It was as if he had stepped inside a long dark tunnel that had no light shining through it, and had turned, only to find the entrance gone, vanished, there no more. No way out but forward into darkness. Like her blindness itself. It scared him. Why? He'd never let anyone or anything hurt her—

He shook the feeling and knelt down, so his shoulders disappeared in the water, lowering her as well. She dipped her head back to draw the tangled mass of her hair away from her face.

He was not surprised by how quickly he wanted her again. This was not as alarming as the force of his desire, for even now as he kept her to him, he felt only a temporary satisfaction. For a moment he understood the distant fear, that there seemed to be no boundaries to his desire; to have her once would be to want her always.

"I want you again," he said with feeling as he tenderly stroked her back as though to atone for the force he used. "And again, Jade Terese." He kissed her mouth; the kiss, so tender, so sweet, elicited small sparks of a new desire. "I had you once with a drugged passion and once with water between us. I want all of you now with nothing and no one between us. Jade, I want you again."

Jade struggled up through her scattered senses, feeling the water slipping over her flushed skin as he stepped toward the shore and then lifted her in his arms. He carried her to the mossy bank, where he lay her down on the soft blanket. He dropped to his knees, his gaze focused on the lush beauty of her nudity.

Her long hair fell in a wet rope to the side and she turned her head to hide her eyes as she uttered his name in a question. Her full breasts thrust prominently upward, their soft firmness crested with rosy pink tips. His next breath came with a sharp gasp as his gaze traveled to the flat narrow waist, the sensuous flare of her hips and down the long legs.

Like Eve before the fall she was, and surrounded by the same untouched bounteous wilderness. A blue sky arched above the canopy of trees, their branches bending as if with the weight of impossibly green moss. Ferns shot up all around them, enclosing them in the rich fragrant scent of earth and all its creation.

He came partially over her and let his mouth touch her moist lips, before he drew back to stare into the darkening pools of her eyes, the long hair trailing like a river of black. "Dear God," he whispered, "I don't want to fall in love with you .. .and yet, and yet ..."

The anguished words sparked a tremor of alarm. The green eyes moved aimlessly about, seeing nothing as a question struggled through the pounding of her heart. "Why don't you want to fall in love with me?"

She could hear each breath punctuating the silence as he contemplated the answer. His hand grazed the slender curve beneath her breasts. Tiny pinpricks of pleasure erupted everywhere their bodies touched. "It has to do with the mystery in your eyes..."

"The mystery?"

"Aye. When I look into your eyes, their beauty mixes with the haunting emptiness brought by your blindness," he whispered, "and your eyes threaten to pull me into a

depth I'd never willingly trespass into." He let his lips caress the sweet moisture on her neck, teasing slowly, feeling a hot shiver race through her body as his large warm hand rested beneath her breast. "It's a surrender, love."

Drawing on her uncanny intuition, she whispered, "It frightens you, this surrender?" "Aye," he said with feeling. "It frightens me. I think it's different for a woman. Surrender is

natural and easier because of it. When a man loses a part of himself to someone else, he loses control." The lingering sunlight fell like kisses across the paleness of her skin, a dance of shadow and light. He followed the shifting light with his fingers. "That's not an easy thing to lose."

She reached her hands to his face, where she let the sensitive pads of her fingertips explore the lines and forms. She found the dramatic arch of his brows, the long curve of his nose and his mouth, a tender yet somehow troubled smile there. Softly, wisely, she told him, "Control is but an illusion, don't you know?"

"Nay, love. Fate is no more than the will of man," he said with masculine simplicity. "It is the name for facts not yet passed under the fire of thought, facts made by nature and the will of men.”

A haunting sadness came over her as she thought of her mother and father, the love that had been stolen from her. She turned her head from him as if to hide. "I wish I could believe that. It is a trick managed only by the most fortunate. Fate is the great director here; irrational, chaotic, and such a great destroyer. She can sweep down and in the space of minutes change the very essence and shape of our lives. And with utter indifference for the casualties."

He thought she spoke of her blindness. The loss, its profundity, had much to do with the intensity of his feeling. His gaze found a bruise on her hip and another on the slender reach of her arm, still another on her knee. Light as a feather he traced his finger over the soft curve of her waist. Her extreme vulnerability, fragility and, aye, her dependency were not qualities he'd willingly choose in a woman he loved. He did not like it and yet he could not stop it from inciting some deep masculine answer from him. The idea came to him that it was this very thing, her blindness, that made him feel as though he were stepping into the blackness of the tunnel. Against his will ...

Fate. He thought of the darkened theater, its rows packed with maybe four hundred people and in this sea of bodies, his gaze had come to her and then stayed with a mystical compulsion he found, even then, irresistible. Fate.

"I am so sorry, Jade."

The whispered words echoed the sadness inside her and yet she guessed he thought of her blindness, rather than the death of her parents. Her blindness. It was impossible for sighted people

to understand that the loss of vision was little more than an inconvenience and as she had learned to maneuver through the dark space, a diminishing one at that.

What had she actually lost? Sightlessness in no way impeded her music. In the deepest sense, it had enhanced her love and appreciation for music. She had a perfect ear and could play almost all the celebrated classical pieces as well as popular ones by ear. She missed reading but was lucky enough to belong to a class that spent the evenings reading out loud, so instead of being the reader she was the recipient.

Her imagination created beautiful sunsets and fields of flowers; she missed them not. "Please, Victor." She gently touched the soft shape of his feelings on his mouth. "How my

misfortune pales alongside others; I am most undeserving of sorrow. For I am blessed." Her smile changed the beat of his heart. "Are you now?"

"Yes, I am." She laughed.

Dear Lord—he smiled—how the sweet music of the sound lifted his sorrow and tossed it away. She raised an arm lazily above herself, unaware of the effect this had, which was rather dramatic.

"For I am blessed with a rich and colorful imagination and this precious blessing paints rainbows in every sky...."

The words made him laugh. "Rainbows?” He kissed her mouth, smiling down at her. "And do you see these miracles of color when I touch you?"

"No." She shook her head, merriment dancing in her eyes. "Oh no. When you kiss me, when you touch me, it's rather more like exploding stars made of red, yellow and gold."

The warm sound of his laughter went through her like a caress. She shifted, smiling as she whispered, "I want to touch you."

He felt a sensuous tease brought by her hands on his body. Circling his head, her fingertips combed his thick hair before gliding. light as a feather, down his neck and over the wide breadth of his shoulders. The innocent pleasure of her hands on his hot skin made a mockery of the thought of will.

Nor did the intensity of his release subdued his response now. He had to close his eyes and count, and not since he was thirteen ...

"You feel so hard and"—an image emerged in her mind—"sleek, like a great Bengal tiger." He chuckled at the innocence and fancy of her words.

"Your skin feels too vibrant to be pale?" "It's not."

A golden color flashed in her mind as she continued. Her hands slide over his back and buttocks. He answered with a sharp intake of breath; she felt his hard flesh tremble beneath her touch. She hesitated before knowing to repeat the gesture. She slid her hands forward, over his flat muscled abdomen and slightly curved chest, teased by the pricks of his hair and the catch of his breath, her hand lingering where she felt the race of his pulse. He didn't know how much he could take and he caught her hands in his.

"No, please," she whispered. "I can't see you.... I don't know what you're feeling." "Pleasure," he said simply. "Intense pleasure. Love, here, let me show you ..."

His wet frame came on top of her. He brought her arms gently to the ground and with his weight resting on his arms, all she felt was the soft burning pressure of his sex on her belly, the tips of her breasts teased by his chest.

Desire was born anew. As his lips met hers, she, too, abandoned herself to a passion too great to resist. "And when I kiss you," he whispered, keeping his mouth close, so very close, "I feel the force of my will slip from my grasp—"

A sweet tingling awakening raced through her. "A surrender ..." "Aye." He kissed her again. "I surrender...."

To fate. The fate of two lovers whose uncertain future stretched far ahead. Even as passion rose, orchestrated by an intensity of feeling and pleasure as new to him as it was to her, he felt, somehow he knew, that he had in fact stepped into that long dark tunnel. And there would come a time when no light would make rainbows arch across their sky....

A thousand bright stars, the white ribbon of the Milky Way filled the black night sky. The campfire burned red, and large flames threw up light like wild Gypsies dancing in the darkness.

Murray sat on a blanket, waiting, watching, listening for signs of Victor's return but hearing only peaceful sounds of the forest: a hum of crickets and other insects, night creatures scurrying over brush and then their own camp's sounds: the crackle of fire, horses shuffling feet, sometimes whining or snorting, Carl's muffled snores from the carriage. Carl never would sleep on the ground like the others.

As carefully as Murray watched, he jumped, startled when Victor appeared. No sign or warning preceding him, suddenly he was just there. Like an Indian warrior, Murray thought, the

impression reinforced by the long bow and arrows swung across his bare chest, a game bag over his shoulder and his dark bronze skin in the shadow of the firelight. He looked a fright all right, and Murray smiled. "You give an old man another start like that and you're likely to lose him."

Victor grinned as he lowered his frame to the ground. In an effort to feel out his mood, Murray asked, "What you catch there?"

"Two ducks, two pheasants and a quail. They're cleaned. I just need to string them up." He rose to fetch the rods and caught sight of Jade sleeping under the mosquito net with Mercedes.

Sebastian slept nearby, alone. "What's this?"

"Sebastian went off looking for you and the lasses just fell asleep together. Mercedes, you know, is like a watchful mother cat around the lass. She is very protective."

"Aren't we all," Victor said.

He walked over to the mat, where he stood staring down at the two sleeping women. They looked so young and childlike, sound asleep, curled up together. They are too young, he thought. Too young to have gone through what they have....

"Come on," Murray whispered. "I'll heat up some supper for you while you string up the

fowl."

The two men's longstanding friendship gave Murray the freedom to ask, "You're fallin' in

love with the lass, aren't you?"

Victor glanced up from his food, shrugged, and then smiled. "I've been in love too many times to take it seriously."

Murray chuckled softly at that, then shook his head. "I know you too well for that. Aye, you've been in love a hundred times, and not once has it been serious. Jade's not like any one of the others. Lord, Jade is the kind of woman who can make the old feel young and the poor feel rich— she is the damnedest, brightest, loveliest—"