Outlaw Carson (13 page)

With an unsteady hand, she placed a ring of
olive on top of each cracker, giving it a little push into the
cheese. The last thing she needed was self-destructing canapés.
She’d never hosted anything as monumental as the auctioning off of
a rare antiquity. Her nerves and her pulse were in a dead heat for
the quarter-mile speed record. Sleep was a memory, and she knew
that every tossing-and-turning hour was beaten into the bags under
her eyes. She’d tried concealer. She’d tried base, mascara, and
eyeliner, and she’d wiped it all off twice, opting instead for huge
earrings as her major distraction.

“Kreestine?”

She jumped at the sound of his voice,
bumping her head on an open cupboard door. She pretended she hadn’t
and pushed another olive ring into the cheese. “What?”

The sharpness of her question sparked an
instant flare of anger in Kit. He tamped it down with the force of
his will, and was amazed at just how much force and how much will
it took to accomplish what had always been an inherently natural
act. He was not pleased either with the deterioration of their
relationship. He’d left her alone too long to suit him and
obviously too long to suit her.

She wore her hair up again, in a style he
hadn’t seen. A wide gold clip arced up the back of her head,
turning her piles of hair into a cascade of ebony curls. Large,
delicate gold earrings, studded with red jewels, hung halfway down
her neck, the first jewelry he’d seen her wear. He liked the
exoticness of them, the tinkling sound they made when she turned
her head. He liked the soft red heavy cotton shirt she wore. It
flowed in a single unadorned piece to the middle of her thighs, and
matched her skintight, ankle-length pants of the same color and
fabric. In his country, he would have had to hide her away in those
pants. He liked the bareness of her feet. He did not like the
smudges of weariness beneath her eyes.

“All this is not necessary, he said,
gesturing at the trays of canapés and the sparkling glasses lining
the counter.

Typical, Kristine thought, her mouth
tightening. She’d slaved the morning away making everything nearly
perfect for his guests, and he had the gall to tell her it wasn’t
necessary. What was she supposed to have done? Invited Lois Shepard
and Thomas Stein into her home, then popped the tops off a couple
of bottles of beer? Men didn’t understand anything.

“But it is very gracious,” he added.
“Lo-eese and Thomas will feel welcomed.”

“Thank you,” she said, shoving olives onto
crackers, not the least bit mollified by his politeness.

“I am grateful,” he said.

“You’re welcome.” A bit too much strength
mashed her last olive ring and broke the cracker beneath. “Dammit.”
She tossed the ruined canapé into the sink and set about
rearranging the tray. Now it would never match the one sitting in
the refrigerator. “Dammit,” she said again. She wanted everything
perfect, organized down to the last damn cracker. She had a point
to prove to herself.

“It’s just a cracker, Kreestine,” he
reassured her.

“No. No, you’re wrong,” she said, her voice
strained. “It was more than a cracker.” Arranging with one hand,
she reached with the other hand and opened the refrigerator door.
She’d have to throw away one of the other canapés in order to get
everything right. In the split second of distraction she heard a
telltale crunch.

Whirling around, she caught him licking his
fingers.

“Good,” he said, offering her a smile.

It was too much. She’d fallen in love with a
heartless barbarian who had no conception of the social graces
required to host visiting dignitaries, or of the importance of
symmetrical canapé trays. Tears she refused to let fall welled in
her eyes, her tired, bloodshot, dark-rimmed eyes.

He reached up to caress her cheek, and his
voice was soft with contrition. “What’s this,
patni
?”

“Don’t call me that, please.” She’d looked
the word up and knew what it meant. Wife. She wasn’t his wife. She
would never be his wife. He was too alive, too sexually male, too
wild, too different, too everything, and she wasn’t enough of
anything, least of all enough of a woman to please him. She tried
to brush his hand away, but he captured her fingers with his
own.

“In this you are wrong, Kreestine.”

Lord help her. All she wanted to do was
die.

“And this I will not allow.”

“Stop it,” she moaned, mortified. She tried
to pull away, but this, it seemed, was another thing he would not
allow. His other hand slid to the back of her neck and closed in a
gentle fist around her hair, tilting her head back and forcing her
to meet his gaze. His eyes, lit with a dark fire, were shot through
with gold and russet, and rich, sensual mysteries.

He guided her arm behind her back and forced
her closer, entwining his fingers with hers and holding her hand at
the base of her spine, taking complete control and leaving her
helpless to resist.

“When we join,
patni
, we will both
know the truth of which I speak.” His voice was a husky drawl, his
lilt muted by the intensity of emotion. “Already I feel the warmth
of your desire and the heat of your need matching mine.”

She felt the heat, too, waves of it like
wind-fanned flames, and if he didn’t kiss her, she
would
die.

He saved her with the barest brushing of his
mouth over hers, teasing her to the point of agony and pushing her
beyond the barrier of past humiliation. She stretched up on tiptoe,
wanting him, nipping at his mouth. He took her, sliding his tongue
down the length of hers and filling her with slow, licking flames
of molten passion.

She groaned and he held her tighter,
intoxicating her with his erotic duel. Canapés disappeared from her
thoughts, along with the kitchen around her, the floor she stood
on, and the very air she breathed. All of her awareness focused on
him and the sensations he created, emotional and physical. His body
hardened against her, his arms tightened, flexing around her with
power and strength, even as he freed her captured hand.

She found good use for it, tunneling her
fingers into the auburn silk framing his face. She traced the curve
of his cheekbones with her thumbs and discovered the delight of
touching his lips as he kissed her. A soft bite proved he liked her
hands there, and when she slid them lower, down the front of his
chest, his low groan proved he liked her hands anywhere as long as
they were on him.

Ah, woman
, he said silently,
willing her to feel his thoughts the way he felt hers,
you are
a welcoming softness in my arms. Your taste is sweet, your scent is
lush with the perfume of arousal. Let me . . . let me . .
.

Yes.

His answer to hers was the sound of his
heavy belt hitting the floor. He swept her up into his arms, and
this time she offered no protest.

“You have agreed?” he asked, carrying her
across the living room. When she didn’t reply, he stopped with one
booted foot on the lowest stair and kissed her again, his teeth
grazing her lips, his tongue plunging inside her mouth, enticing
her into submission. The long, deep strokes were unnecessary, but
too pleasurable to stop. She met each one with a sigh, and Kit felt
those sighs like a slow pull on his loins.

“You have agreed,” he growled, breaking the
kiss and continuing up the stairs to her bedroom. He would take her
there, among the white lace and pillows, the frills of woman’s
things. Later that night she would sleep with him wrapped in the
warmth of his arms and his blankets and robes, and he would take
her again.

He lowered her to the bed, then followed her
down into the disarray of cotton sheets and satin comforters,
inhaling her lingering scent on the fabric and nuzzling his face
into the crook of her neck, finding there the headier pleasures of
the woman herself.

His mouth glided across her skin, tasting,
leaving a trail of irresistible, wet warmth. She wanted his mouth
again on hers.

The desire no sooner blossomed in her mind
than it was fulfilled with urgency and passion, his firm lips
stealing the need and answering the yearning, and bringing upon her
an even greater yearning. The pressure of his weight upon her, of
his thigh pressing up between her legs, did crazy things to her
thoughts. She instinctively lifted her hips higher.

Kit slipped a hand beneath her, holding her
there, and slowly raised his head. A languorous smile played about
his mouth, and he increased the pressure ever so slightly, rubbing
against her.

“This is a very good game, eh?” One brow
lifted in knowing confirmation as she gasped. Fully clothed, he
made her feel things she’d only ready about—and then he began to
remove his clothes.

On his knees above her, straddling her hips,
he unbuttoned the first few buttons on his black tunic, then pulled
the shirt over his head. Muscle moved beneath his dark skin, smooth
and graceful, rippling in a rhythm to match his every movement and
making her long to touch him.

“This you shall do,
patni
, in many
ways,” he assured her, pulling her upright. In one smooth, fluid
motion, he slipped her long shirt off, removing the clip from her
hair in the same gesture. It was magic, it had to be, but no more
so than the look in his eyes when he saw what she wore beneath.

Her dark hair slid over her creamy white
shoulders and the soft, heavy curves of her breasts cupped in red
lace, and the knot of desire in his belly tightened. He had not
expected red lace, not on Kristine.

He lifted his gaze to her eyes and knew the
only teasing he dared was with his mouth. She wanted him, but was
unsure of the path. The uncertainty bound her to him in yet another
way. He wanted her, too, but first he needed to erase all of her
doubts. When he took her, it would be as he’d promised, with her
own fire matching his, with her own need pulling him farther than
she’d been before.

Delicately, he traced the edge of the lace
with his fingers, and he let all the wonder he felt fill his voice
with tenderness. “There is much love in my heart for you,
Kreestine,” he murmured, easing her back on the bed. He lowered his
mouth to her breast and lost himself in the erotic sensation of
tasting her softness through the barrier of red lace.

Soon that barrier became too much, and with
another skilled movement he left her wondering about a Far Eastern
barbarian’s understanding of the workings of Western lingerie. Her
bra joined the pile of clothes building on the floor, piece by
incredible piece. His mouth trailed over her, leaving gentle love
bits on her skin. His hands followed with tantalizing caresses,
until she had no choice but to touch him in turn.

His body was like satin and steel, hard and
so very alive, and soft on the tips of her fingers, so warm. The
heat of him invaded her on every level of feeling, from the
sentient layer of her skin to the hidden corners of her mind. He
took the dark coldness of her doubts and filled them with light and
drugging sensation. Her senses pooled wherever he seared her with
his mouth, making her believe each place was where she needed him
most, until he moved to the next, and the next.

This time, when she tilted her head and
rubbed her mouth against his skin, he let her taste. Her teeth
grazed his jaw, lightly, with just enough force to let him know she
was there. She rolled with him when he removed her leggings,
thinking only of retracing the path with her tongue and returning
to the hot, sweet magic of his mouth. With just his kiss he gave
her more pleasure than she’d ever known, for his kiss demanded
everything from her and returned it all twofold.

Willingly, she fell deeper under the spell
he wove, moving to the gentle commands she felt and marveling at
his responses to her. Her every caress heightened his arousal,
giving her the power he relinquished and sweeping her higher and
higher. He laved the satin softness of her inner thigh with his
tongue, then went farther, teaching her things no monk had ever
imagined. She gasped, and he relented, but only long enough to
reach her bare breasts and start the spiral of desire anew.

He was masculinity personified at its
gentlest and most invincible, an erotically fascinating mix of
carefully controlled physical strength and unleashed emotions. He
gave her the best of both, inciting her mind with the visual
clarity of his most sensuous thoughts and inducing a fever of need
in her body. He touched her in places and in ways she’d never
dreamed of until he’d given her the dream in her mind.

With the quiet insistence of his thoughts he
told her what he wanted. With the guidance of his hands he taught
her the moves. When she hesitated, he urged her on. When she
complied, he whispered words of satisfaction in her ear, his voice
rough with the depth of his pleasure.

“Ah, Kreestine . . . Kreestine . . .” He
stiffened above her, his breathing unsteady. He’d played the game
too long; she’d learned too quickly. She caressed him again, her
hand slipping between the gaping opening of his pants, and doing
only what he’d asked, but it was too much. Against his wishes, he
found himself pressing into her palm, his thoughts chaotically
focused on one driving need—to be inside her.

The picture of his need was clear in her
mind, shimmering in waves of heat and the sensation he promised
her. With his smoldering gaze he forced her to hold the thought,
living with him the loving to come. His hands were sure and quick
as he stood up and took off his jeans, and never once did he let
her lose sight of what he wanted, what he would have—her melting
over him, tightening around him. The heat built and built inside
her, fueled by his desires and her understanding, until she closed
her eyes and moaned.