“There’s nothing to be afraid of now.” Except for the vulture whispering all these sweet lies in your ear. He felt lower than a snake. And unable to stop himself.
She liked his arms around her. Liked being held against his chest, feeling the unsteady rhythm of his heartbeat. Unsteady? She realized it was. As erratic as her own. And thundering like a runaway stagecoach.
“I’m glad it will be morning soon. I was feeling so lost and frightened until I found you here. And I’m still a long way from home.” She shivered and felt his arms tighten around her.
“I’ll be right here with you. I’m not going anywhere.” He framed her face and stared down into her eyes. The touch of her stripped his mind of all thought but one. He had to taste her. Now. His hands tangled in her hair, drawing her head back.
She could read the desire in his eyes. For a moment she stiffened. Then, just as quickly, she relented.
His lips nibbled hers and he filled himself with the sweet, exotic taste of her. The kiss was easy, gentle, giving her a chance to draw away. But she didn’t. Couldn’t. Not with the dark, mysterious flavor of him filling her senses, and the slow, drugging need for him beginning to stir.
“Jade.” His voice was a sigh against her lips. “Tell me to stop.”
“No. I…” Instead of drawing away, she leaned closer and brought her arms around his waist. Her fingertips encountered bare flesh where his shirt had tugged free. Her breath hitched in her throat. “I can’t.”
The moment she touched him, his arms tightened around her, drawing her firmly against the length of him.
“Neither can I.”
Now there was nothing gentle or civilized about the kiss. His mouth savaged hers. With teeth and tongue and lips he plundered, giving her no time to think.
He’d known. Known that all the careful planning, the proper manners, the civility could be peeled away in one careless moment. That’s why he had worked so hard to avoid this. To avoid her. But it no longer mattered. All that mattered was this. The heat. The power. The pleasure. The woman in his arms.
The need to touch her was too great. He ran a hand up her back, over her shoulder, along her throat.
She moved under his touch, arching herself like a cat with each stroke. If she were a cat, she’d be purring. His touch soothed her, eased her tension, brushed away her fears. Then, just as she began to relax, that same touch aroused, electrified, struck sparks.
“Wade. Hold me.” Her body was alive with needs. Needs that had her responding to his kiss in a way she’d never dreamed possible.
Her hands clutched at the front of his shirt, drawing him closer.
“Kiss me.”
With a little moan her lips opened to his probing tongue. She drank in the taste of him, dark and mysterious, and wanted more. When he took the kiss deeper, she sighed and moved in his arms, discovering needs she hadn’t even known existed.
The moment his lips touched hers he was lost, caught up in a passion so unexpected, so unsettling, it startled him.
He knew he needed to back away. Now, before he crossed the line. But as he took the kiss deeper, all thought fled. All he could do was hold her, touch her, taste her, until he had his fill.
She tasted as exotic as she looked. Like a rare flower that grew in some secluded glade. Like a unique spice that remained on the tongue to tease, to tempt.
And all the while he continued to kiss her, and stroke her, until the heat rose up between them, making them half-mad with it.
The thought of stripping off her clothes and lying with him, flesh to flesh, had her breath coming harder, faster. With a sigh she gave herself up to the pleasure Wade was offering. Pleasure beyond anything she had ever known.
As his mouth continued to plunder hers, she forgot everything she’d ever learned about resisting a man’s advances. All her tutoring, all her training had been in vain. All she could do was cling to him while his lips brought her pleasure beyond belief.
In some small corner of her mind she heard a sigh that spoke of passion, of gradually awakening desire. But she didn’t recognize it as her own voice.
“I thought I could fight this. But I don’t have the strength,” he murmured against her throat. “I want you, Jade. And have since the first time I saw you.”
He lifted his head and studied her in the light of the fire. Her lips were warm and moist and thoroughly kissed. Her eyes were heavy-lidded with passion. Her chest rose and fell with each labored breath.
“And I…I want…” She pursed her lips in a little pout when she saw the way he was staring at her.
Suddenly, without warning, he lifted a finger to her lips and traced their fullness, then dipped his finger into the moistness of her mouth. Next he lifted his finger to his own mouth and tasted her.
She froze at the flashback to her past.
This couldn’t be happening.
He couldn’t be…
She gasped. Her eyes rounded in shock and recognition. For a moment she felt as if all the air had been squeezed from her lungs. Then, finding her voice, she managed to say, “It was you.”
At her words, he studied her through narrowed eyes.
“The voice that night was only a whisper. And your face was different. Heavily bearded like a mountain man. But I’ve never forgotten the way you kissed me on my sixteenth birthday. And the way you traced my lips, as though…tasting me.”
After a lengthy silence he found his voice and reached for her. “You’ve mistaken me for someone else.”
“No.” She pushed free of his arms, feeling suddenly cold. With her breath coming hard and fast she looked at him, as if seeing him for the first time. “You were dressed all in black. You were gambling. And winning. Someone called you Nevada. And you killed a man. Calmly, without emotion. And then you kissed me.”
When he said nothing in his own defense she scrambled to her feet and stalked across the room, needing to put some distance between them.
With her back to him she stared into the flames of the fire and said, “It’s bad enough that you’re a gambler and a gunman. But to make matters worse, you’re a liar, as well.” She turned and pinned him with a look of pure hatred. “The worst sort of liar, who passes himself off as a man of peace.”
She felt tears sting her eyes and blinked them back. She wouldn’t allow herself to cry over the shattered memory she had foolishly cherished all these years. The memory of her first kiss from a man who’d excited her. And fueled her dreams. Oh, such wonderful, fanciful dreams. “How could you do this? How could you lie to me?”
Because he still wanted to reach out to her, he curled his hands into fists at his sides. His voice was carefully controlled. “It isn’t a lie. I am a man of peace. At least, I try to be. And I’ll make no apology for the kiss. Then or now. As for honesty, Miss Jewel, if you were being honest, you’d have to admit that you returned my kisses.” His lips curved into a bitter smile. “Then, and now.”
Because it was the truth, and hit too close to home, she lifted her chin in that haughty manner he’d come to know so well. Fury turned her voice into a weapon as sharp, as cutting, as the blade at her waist. “At least now that I know what your game is, I have the decency to put an end to it. As for you, you have no decency at all. You lied to me. And you lied to the people of Hanging Tree. This is all some sort of cruel, heartless game to you, isn’t it?”
“A game?”
Her mind raced. “Didn’t you tell me that you had no intention of staying here? That these people meant nothing to you? For all I know, you could be using your charms to learn about the people of Hanging Tree, so you can take advantage of them. Just as you took advantage of me. Is that what you’re planning?”
He had gone very still. The anger that simmered inside wasn’t visible on his face, or in his voice when he spoke. “That isn’t even worthy of a response.” He glanced toward the closed door. “It’ll be light soon. I’ll see you home.”
“You needn’t bother. I can take care of myself.”
He was across the room in quick strides, his hands closing over the tops of her arms in a painful grasp. “I said I’d see you home. After that, you’ll never have to see me again.”
Pain and anger made her careless. “That suits me just fine. The sight of you makes me sick. Now take your hands off me.”
He should have released her. But his own anger got the better of him. “A minute ago you liked my hands on you. A minute ago you were wondering what it would feel like to indulge yourself in pleasures of the flesh with me.”
There was a dangerous light in his eyes. A light that frightened yet excited her, causing her pulse rate to climb.
She hated him for having read her emotions so easily. Though she wanted to deny it, it would be a lie. She had wanted him. And still did, if truth be told.
“It isn’t too late, Miss Jewel.” His tone hardened. “You could find out right now. Right here. Would you like that? Would you like me to show you just how easy it would be? And just how pleasurable?”
Just as in San Francisco, Jade was both attracted to and repelled by the danger, the unknown. But to her credit, she kept her voice carefully controlled. “Let go of me.”
He watched her eyes as he lowered his hands to his sides and took a step back. Her fear of him had faded, but not entirely. Though she kept her head high, her spine rigid, there was a wary, watchful expression in her eyes.
He should apologize for that last outburst. But he was still too furious. Instead he turned on his heel and headed for the door. “I’ll get the horses.”
Chapter Ten
Though dawn light streaked the eastern horizon, the sky was still awash in stars. Widow’s Peak silhouetted against a backdrop of pearl light was a spectacular sight that never failed to stir the soul. But the two who viewed it this day took no notice.
They rode the entire distance in silence.
Jade didn’t know which was worse—the cold fury in Wade’s eyes or the extremely polite manners he exhibited.
He remained directly beside her the entire way. And yet he only looked at her when it was absolutely necessary. When her horse stumbled he reached a hand to steady her, then withdrew it immediately, as though the touch of her repelled him.
Her heart had never felt so heavy. Her mood had never been so blue. Reverend Wade Weston was a fraud, a cheat, a liar. And so was the handsome, mysterious gunman from her past whose memory had fueled her dreams. Everything he stood for was a lie.
She’d been a fool. A silly, childish fool. And she had no one to blame but herself. She had known, or rather sensed, that the gunman in the Golden Dragon had things to hide. Why else would he have disappeared without a trace, never to be seen in San Francisco again?
What better way for a gunman with a past to start a new life than to pose as a man of peace? Perhaps that was why she had never made the connection between Wade Weston and the mysterious gunman. Though both had stirred something inside her, they had seemed the extreme opposite of one another. To realize now that they were one and the same man…
In her mind the most shocking thing of all was that, regardless of his pose, he was the only man who had ever touched her. She had not only permitted it, she had encouraged it.
She had shamed her mother, who had taught her—for the success of her business—to hold herself aloof from all men. And she had shamed her father, who had always prided himself on being a fine judge of people. How could she have given her heart to a liar and a cheat?
As they paused on a hill overlooking the Jewel ranch, Jade broke her self-imposed silence. “I wish to ride the rest of the way alone.”
“I said I’d see you safely home.”
“No.” Her eyes flashed a challenge. “If you’re concerned for my safety, you can remain here until I reach the barn. But I don’t want you to come any closer to my home.”
He gave a curt nod. “As you wish, Miss Jewel.”
She shot him an icy stare. “Is Wade Weston your real name? Or did you invent that, as well?”
His eyes were as hard as granite. “I thought you knew, Miss Jewel. Everything about me is phony.” He touched a hand to the brim of his hat and wheeled his mount.
She remained where she was until he disappeared over a rise. Then, with a heavy heart, she turned her horse toward home.
Diamond, Pearl and Ruby came racing from the house when they spied her horse.
“Where have you been?” Diamond shouted.
“We were so worried,” Pearl called before Jade could say a word, “when one of your horses returned without you!”
“The wranglers spent the night scouring the countryside, chérie,” Ruby scolded.
“I’m sorry. Truly sorry. Forgive me.” As Jade slid from the horse, she told them about encountering the gang of outlaws, and how she had managed to outrun them.
“Another night with the good reverend,” Ruby said with a sly laugh.
Jade’s lips curved into a scowl. “And the last.”
“What’s wrong?” Diamond asked, sensing the underlying pain in her words. “What’s happened?”
“Nothing,” Jade said quickly. Too quickly. All three of her sisters were watching her closely. “Now, if you don’t mind, I would like a bath and a chance to sleep in a bed.”
As she hurried away, the three young women looked at one another in consternation. Something had happened to rob Jade of her usual sunny nature. But from the look in her eyes, she had no intention of sharing it with anyone.
“It was those murderous outlaws,” Diamond said, checking the pistols in her holsters.
“Of course. That sort of fear would weigh heavily on anyone’s mind,” Pearl said with an emphatic nod.
Ruby clucked her tongue. “If you ask me, it is not the band of outlaws that causes Jade such unhappiness. It is something else. Or someone else.”
Whatever it was, Jade kept it to herself. For the rest of the day she remained in her room, the door firmly locked. Even Carmelita’s spiced chicken couldn’t budge her from her isolation.
Late that night, as her three sisters started up the stairs to bed, she announced that she was leaving the following morning for San Francisco.
“This has all happened so quickly. I wish you’d reconsider.” Diamond, dressed in her usual buckskins, stood between Pearl and Ruby, watching with dismay as the stagecoach driver loaded Jade’s trunks.
As always, the presence of the Jewel sisters in the town of Hanging Tree drew a crowd of curious onlookers.
Marshal Quent Regan sauntered from his office to pause in the dusty street. His deputy, Arlo Spitz, ambled out behind him, squinting in the afternoon sun. Several men, women and children wandered from Durfee’s Mercantile to stop and watch. Lavinia Thurlong and Gladys Witherspoon pushed past everyone, hoping to catch a word or phrase of conversation.
“Looks like you’re taking a trip,” Lavinia called.
Jade merely nodded.
“Interesting,” Gladys said with an arched brow. “I hear Reverend Weston’s gone and left town, too. Told Millie Potter he didn’t know when he’d be back.”
The Jewel women stared at each other in consternation, then turned to Jade. But from the tight line of her lips, they knew she wasn’t about to add to their store of knowledge on the subject of the good preacher.
The sisters, knowing every word would be repeated throughout the countryside, lowered their voices.
“I wish you’d stay,” Diamond said stiffly.
“I told you.” Jade drew Diamond close for a quick hug. “It’s important that I see to my mother’s business. She poured her life into the Golden Dragon. It’s a valuable commodity. I must find a buyer for it.”
“But you gave us no warning,” Pearl complained. “And now you say you may be gone for weeks, or even months. Why now? And why must you stay away so long?” The young woman’s usually smooth brow was furrowed with concern, especially now that she had heard about the reverend’s leave-taking. There was something amiss here.
Jad
e squeezed her hand, then gathered her close and kissed her soft, pale cheek. “My building is nearing completion here in town. It will need to be furnished. There are things in the Golden Dragon in San Francisco that would be useful here. I must catalog the many treasures and consider each item very carefully before deciding which to keep and which will be sold. And then there are my employees. Once I’ve arranged for a broker to sell the building, I intend to arrange jobs for all who depend upon me.”
“Promise you will be careful, chérie,” Ruby whispered as she opened her arms for a tender embrace. “It is a long journey from here to San Francisco.”
“I promise.”
“It is not just the journey that concerns me,” Ruby muttered for Jade’s ears alone. “It is you and a certain…gentleman. I think there is much between you that you have not told us.”
“Don’t worry. I can take care of myself. As for the gentleman—” she sighed “—he doesn’t deserve that title.” She breathed in the heady perfume of the bayou that always seemed to surround this young woman. “I’ll miss you, Ruby.” She turned to the others. “I’ll miss all of you.”
The driver lashed the trunks to the top of the stage and climbed down. “We’re ready to roll, Miss Jewel.”
“Thank you.” She placed a small hand in his and allowed him to help her into the stage. As he closed the door, she leaned out the window and caught her sisters’ outstretched hands. “Don’t worry about me. I’ll return before you have time to miss me.”
As the team leaned into the harness and the stage lurched ahead, Jade watched until the town of Hanging Tree had faded into the dust. Then she leaned back and closed her eyes, surprised by the prickle of tears behind her closed lids.
So, the truth had driven Wade away. She wouldn’t cry, she told herself. There would be no tears shed over Wade Weston, or whatever his name was. Not now. Not ever. He was out of her life. For good.