Sundancer (Cheyenne Series) (27 page)

      
The Remington woman was waiting for him as he crossed the lobby, heading toward the stairs. She materialized from behind a tall potted palm and placed one small hand sparkling with rings on his chest. “How delightful that we meet again, sugar. I know you couldn't tell me about wild Indians at table...but now we can be alone...and I am insatiably curious.”

      
She drew closer and he could smell her musky perfume, heavy and sweet. After his rebuff of her at the dinner table, her boldness startled him. “You'll have to find another tour guide to satisfy that curiosity,” he said in the soft deadly voice that made men tremble with fear.

      
She trembled another way altogether, licking her lips in that practiced sexual gesture. When he tried to brush her hand away, she slid her fingers in the front of his shirt, anchoring them in the crisp black hair, pulling until he cursed in annoyance at the discomfort. “My lands, what a shame your poor little wife is ill with a migraine.”

      
“Why, Mrs. Remington, thank you so much for your concern. But I experienced a remarkable recovery as soon as I learned you'd left the ladies to their gossip,” Roxanna purred. She glided up to them as Sabrina hissed in shock and stepped back. Placing one hand proprietarily on Cain's shoulder, Roxanna added with an arch smile, “This wild Indian is already taken. I suggest you look for another—or perhaps content yourself with the man you married, even if he does seem a bit old for wildness...of any sort.”

      
For one instant Cain thought Sabrina was going to launch herself at Alexa. His wife did not even flinch but stood calmly, staring down at the shorter woman as if daring her. Sabrina Remington drew herself up with a nasty smirk. “I heard you lived with savages out West. Now I know it isn't just idle gossip.”

      
After she stalked away, Roxanna turned to Cain, smoothing his shirt where Sabrina had wrinkled it. “It looks as if I saved you from having your chest scalped.”

      
He scowled down at her possessive gesture. “I could’ve gotten rid of her without help. Hell, Alexa, all I need is to try explaining to Jubal how you got both eyes blacked in a catfight with a senator's wife.”

      
“You act as if I'd lose,” she replied, affronted before she realized how boldly she had behaved. Was he displeased by her forwardness—or worse yet, angry because she interrupted a tryst?

      
Before she could turn away, he reached out and pulled her tightly into his arms. “I'd bet on you every time, Her Back Is Straight,” he murmured, inhaling the subtle lilac scent of her hair. “This is our one night in a bed that isn't rolling over the rails. Let's take advantage of it.”

      
Breathless, she looked up into his eyes and read the hot raw hunger in them. Without another word, he scooped her up into his arms and strode to the deserted back stairs. In moments they entered their suite. The maid took one look at the way Cain held his wife and mumbled her excuses.

      
“You're awfully hard on help,” she murmured against his throat, not sounding particularly concerned as he set her down in front of him and began unfastening the row of tiny satin-covered button loops running down the back of her gown. With his arms around her, he was working blind, but he was exceedingly deft at the task. “You've had lots of practice disrobing ladies,” she said with a hint of crossness in her voice.

      
He smiled against her hair. “Not exactly ladies...but there was this dancer on the Barbary Coast who wore satin costumes with buttons—”

      
She gave him a playful punch in the stomach. “I don't want to hear about your other women... Were there terribly many of them?” She chewed her lip in vexation.

      
“As many as leaves on the trees, as plentiful as buffalo on the prairie,” he replied with a mock accent as he peeled the heavy dress from her shoulders and began tugging it down her arms.

      
In spite of herself, Roxanna giggled. “All right, great chief. Be serious. They were sporting women who knew…” She felt her courage evaporate as his hands stilled on her arms. “That is...they knew how to please you.”

      
‘‘Not half as much as you please me,” he admitted.

      
“But I don't really do that much. You do it all.” Her face reddened in mortification. Whatever had she blurted out now? The encounter with the beauteous and sophisticated Sabrina Remington must have unhinged her mind—it certainly had her tongue!

      
One black eyebrow raised in amusement. She had such natural passion, all the right instincts in spite of the repression of her upbringing. He could teach her much and he knew she'd prove an apt pupil. He chuckled. “Oh, so you want to
do
more?”

      
His hands had continued their swift efficient task as they spoke until she was standing before him in nothing but high-heeled slippers, stockings and filmy undergarments. Dress and petticoats were pooled at her feet. He was still fully clothed. He raised her hands to his chest, willing her to continue. “Lesson one—a man likes a woman to undress him sometimes.” With trembling, clumsy fingers she began removing the diamond studs as he shrugged out of the jacket. He held one palm out for her to deposit the sparkling jewelry.

      
When she had completed the task, he stood still, arms down until she peeled the shirt off his broad shoulders and discarded it. In so doing, her face moved close to his chest. The male scent of him filled her nostrils. Looking up into his eyes, she inhaled the heady aroma and he smiled, as if knowing how his nearness affected her.

      
“Don't stop now.” His voice rumbled low, breaking the silence.

      
Working up her courage, she reached for his fly and began to unfasten the buttons. Then, feeling his shaft press against her fingers, she hesitated, biting her lip. His low wicked chuckle added more heat to her already flaming face. He stilled her hands and pulled away, whispering hoarsely, “Let me.”

      
Roxanna watched as he quickly pulled off his shoes, then yanked off his trousers and underwear. Her breath caught at the sheer male beauty of him, tall, lean, bronzed skin covering hard sinuous muscles. She stood still, entranced as he took her hand, expecting him to finish removing the rest of her clothes now that he was completely naked.

      
He surprised her. When they reached the bed, he stretched out on it, looking up at her and saying, “Lesson two—sometimes a man also likes a woman to undress for him while he watches. Real slow.” The words were lazily drawled. A dare.

      
Roxanna had from her earliest successes as a spy considered herself a consummate actress who could assume any sort of role. But could she do this? Act the part of a bold, wanton woman using her body to entice, seduce, enslave? She studied his languorous pose, noting his rock-hard straining staff. He was certainly moved by her initial ministrations. A slow smile began to work its way across her face. Perhaps she could do some teaching.

      
Watching her from beneath hooded eyelids, he sensed the change immediately. A subtle shift from blushes and reticence to a new realization of her power. When he had told her before that a woman had power over a man, he knew she had not believed him. But she did now.
What have I done?
he thought uneasily as Alexa began to tug ever so slowly at the drawstring of her chemise. When it came loose, she wriggled her shoulders, provocative as Lilith. The wispy silk fell over a creamy expanse of flesh and caught, just barely caught, on the hardened tip of one nipple.

      
He almost jumped straight off the bed. Only by a sheer act of will, clenching his fists in the sheets, did he remain recumbent. She let the chemise cling, turning her attention to her earrings, removing one sapphire pendulum, then the other. Her fingers toyed with the heavy necklace nestling between her breasts, then glided past it, ignoring the chemise, moving to the tapes holding up her lacy pantalets. She unfastened them with mind-bendingly delicious hesitation. “You might hurry just a bit,” he urged, alarmed at how hoarse he was. Damn, he was on fire!

      
Roxanna could see the effect she was having on him, hear it in his voice. She slid her hands around her waist and began to slide the lacy underdrawers down, pausing at her navel, then moving lower to the curve of her hips. When his breathing hitched again, she stopped, gliding her splayed fingers back up to the edge of the chemise, tugging on the bottom while shrugging her covered shoulder free of the silk. This time it slithered past both rigid nipples, baring her breasts.

      
The silk bunched around her waist. She gathered it in her hands and stretched her arms up, pulling it slowly over her head, then tossed it to him. The gauzy white silk seemed to float across the space between them. He reached out his hand and caught it, bringing it to his lips, inhaling.

      
“Lilacs,” he murmured, his eyes riveted to the pale pink rosettes crowning her breasts.

      
They seemed to tighten even more as he stared, fueling the low fire building deep inside her belly.
The slower I go, the hotter I feel,
she thought ruefully. She was desperate for him to touch her, to take her this very moment! She undulated her hips in an unmistakable roll and the lacy drawers dropped to her knees. She kicked them away and stood for a moment. Clad only in high-heeled slippers and silk stockings held up by pale blue satin garters, she remembered the way they had made such wild love against the wall in their railcar and wondered if he too was thinking of it.

      
He was. His reckless hunger that day had worried him, not just the fear that he would frighten his bride with his lust, but also that he was uncontrollably enthralled by this slim blond woman. His throat closed up when she placed one small foot on the edge of the mattress and worked it free of the dark blue satin slipper. He could smell the sweet musk of her body, ready, eager for him. She flexed her knee provocatively. He never realized just how long, how slender her legs were until she began to roll down the garter, peeling the silk stocking along with it. She tossed the first stocking on the floor, then reached up for the heavy gold clasp of the sapphire necklace.

      
“Hmmm. I think I'll leave this on...for modesty's sake.” She turned her attention to her remaining shoe and removed it and her last stocking, even more slowly.

      
Just as she started to toss away the stocking, he encircled her slender ankle with his hand and tumbled her onto the bed. He caught the stocking as he rolled her across him and onto her back in the center of the big mattress. When he raised up over her and looked down into her eyes, he could not mistake the feline satisfaction and triumph. Her arms encircled his shoulders, pulling him closer.

      
‘‘Was that something like you had in mind?” she asked innocently. All the while her heart beat frantically and need for him clawed deep in her belly.

      
“Something like,” he echoed, obliging her with a deep hungry kiss, opening his mouth and molding his lips on hers, hot as a furnace. His tongue swept across the seam of her lips and plunged inside when she opened, drawing her tongue to mate with it, sucking, then thrusting his tongue in swift sweet strokes until she was breathless.

      
Her fingers burrowed through his hair, holding on to his head as he savaged her mouth with rapacious kisses. When he moved lower to her throat, pausing at one ear to flick the tip of his tongue inside, she shivered with pleasure. Smiling, he ran his mouth over the furiously thrumming pulse in her throat. His hand cupped one pearly breast with its pale pink crest standing erect, begging to be caressed. He tweaked it between finger and thumb until she whimpered, then slid down to place his mouth on it. She arched up, digging her nails into the banded muscles of his back. As he suckled one breast, his hand readied the other for the sweet ministration of his mouth.

      
He felt her quiver as tiny moans of pleasure escaped her lips. At length, he moved away from the feast of her breasts, tracing a wet trail with his tongue down to her navel. His hands spanned her slim waist, then slid over the curve of her hips, as his face pressed into the concave softness of her belly. Her head tossed from side to side on the pillows, spilling pale hair like a silvery waterfall about her shoulders. She writhed, still emitting the little sounds of pleasure until his mouth brushed the soft curls at the apex of her thighs. Roxanna stiffened and raised her head. “Cain, what are you doing?”

Chapter Thirteen

      
“Making love to my wife,” he paused long enough to reply raggedly. “Lie back.” He cupped the round smoothness of her buttocks in his hands and lifted her hips like an offering on a pagan altar.

      
“You can't—”

      
“Oh, but I can,” he murmured, nuzzling her moist pink petals with his lips, then letting his tongue flick out, seeking the swollen little bud at the core of her body. The instant he touched it, he could feel her response. A low keening cry issued from her lips. She grew very still, terrified with this strange new and intense loving.

      
Hearing her moans of helpless ecstasy, he applied himself to the unfamiliar exercise. He had mostly used whores when he needed sex and this was not an act he would perform on them. This was a special gift for a sensuous, passionate woman who enjoyed lovemaking as much as her man did. Alexa was made to be loved this way and he was enjoying teaching her, enjoying it more than he would ever have imagined possible.

      
Feeling the heat of his mouth on her, her mind simply shut down and her body took over. She should be shocked, horrified. This was depraved, sinful...unimaginable, delicious...