Drew (The Cowboys) (36 page)

“I’m going to turn over,” he said. “I want you to back up against me. The only way to get you warm is for our bodies to touch as much as possible.”

Drew didn’t move.

“I promise I won’t touch you.”

“How can you keep me warm if you don’t touch me?”

“I’m trying to say I won’t take advantage of you.”

“I never thought you would. My brothers said the most desirable female is a hot one. I’m as cold as an iceberg.”

Drew backed up to him. She hadn’t exaggerated. She felt so cold, he wondered if even his body heat could warm her. He pulled her close, tucked his legs under hers, and wrapped his arms around her.

“Curl into a ball,” he said.

She pulled her knees up to her breasts. He rested his arm across her legs and tried to will his body not to respond to her presence.

“What else did your brothers tell you?”

“They never told me anything. I had to eavesdrop if I wanted to hear.”

“And what did you learn?”

“That they don’t think much of women who give themselves to men.”

“Most men feel like that until they meet the woman they’ll love for the rest of their lives. Then they consider the sharing of her body her greatest gift.”

“You would consider your wife more precious than sons?”

“I would if she were the one woman I would love for the rest of my life.”

“How will you know when you meet her?”

“I already have.”

She didn’t speak for a long time. “How did you know?” she asked in a soft voice.

“I didn’t at first. I had to have lots of signs before I figured it out. I found I was thinking of you all the time, wanting to be with you. I was jealous of the time you spent with Myrtle, jealous of the confidences you shared with your brothers. I couldn’t imagine spending the rest of my life without you.”

“How can something like that happen? You don’t really know anything about me.”

“I don’t know. It just did. Did it happen like that for Jake and Isabelle?”

“No. They fought for weeks. But it was like that for Ward and Marina. Her father had arranged for her to marry Ward’s brother. As soon as they saw each other, they fell in love.”

“We’re more like Jake and Isabelle. We were so busy arguing we didn’t realize we had fallen in love.”

“We?”

“Yes. You love me, too.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“If you didn’t, you wouldn’t have tried so hard to run away.”

She pulled her body into a smaller ball, hugged her legs tightly against her. “Does love make you feel confused?”

“Sometimes.”

“Can it make you want the opposite of everything you’ve always wanted?”

“Yes.”

“Can it make you feel miserable and unhappy?”

“Yes, but it can also give you unimaginable happiness.”

“When does that start?”

“When both people admit their love and share it.”

“Does it make you afraid?”

“It can certainly make you feel vulnerable. But if you trust the man you love, there will be no fear. Only happiness.”

“There’s so much to think about.”

“Then think only of one thing, that I love you with all my heart. No matter what else happens, that will never change.”

“I love you. I don’t want to, but I do.”

Warmth flooded Cole. For the first time since being thrown into the river, he didn’t feel cold. “Is that such a terrible thing?”

In a flurry of movement, Drew uncurled her body and turned to face him. “Yes! It’s awful Everything’s all mixed up. I don’t know what I want anymore. I want to run my own ranch, but I want you helping me. I want to go home to Texas, but I’ll follow you wherever you go. I’ve never wanted to cook and clean and have babies, but I’d do all that for you. But if I did, I’d hate myself.”

“I’d never make you do anything you didn’t want to do.”

Cole was having a hard time keeping his mind on what Drew was saying. Her movement had caused his forearm to fall against the side of one breast, the other to lie cupped in his palm. He had a vivid mental image of the vee of her thighs, scant inches from his swelling manhood. In a few more moments, his body would be completely beyond his control.

“I’m not talking about you,” Drew said, hitting his bare chest with her balled-up fist. “I’m talking about me. I feel like there are two of me inside, engaged in a fight to the death. I want both of them to win.”

Her agitation caused her breast to move in his hand. Instantly his body became rigid with desire. It seemed incredible to him that Drew could be completely unaware of the closeness of their naked bodies while it was impossible for him to think of anything else.

“That’s okay,” said Cole. It really wasn’t. He wanted Drew to love him so deeply everything else would seem unimportant, but he wasn’t about to tell her she was the most cussedly obstinate female he’d ever met. “I won’t ask you to make any promises until you’ve had time to decide what you really want.”

He intended to do everything in his power to make certain she wanted him.

“But I want you to make hundreds of promises,” she said as she huddled against him. “And I know that’s unfair, since I’m not ready to make even one. Hold me close. Make me forget my head feels like it’s got a cyclone inside.”

“If you get any closer, I’m going to break every promise I’ve made to you and to myself.”

“Are you excited?”

He laughed ruefully. “You could say that.”

“When my brothers got in that condition, Jake would tell them to take a swim in the river and cool off.”

“I’ve had all the swimming in the river I care for.”

“I guess you have.” She paused. “Are you still hot?”

“And getting hotter.”

“Is it because of me?”

“Yes.”

“Nobody ever got hot because of me before.”

“I’m sure they did. Jake should have told you it’s dangerous to get a man hot.”

“Why?”

“We’re not very good at controlling ourselves.”

“Isabelle says a gentleman can always control himself.”

“I’m reluctant to contradict Isabelle, but this gentleman is about to explode. I imagine your brothers would have felt the same way.”

“Isabelle said they weren’t gentlemen. She said Jake had ruined them all, teaching them to think it was natural for a man to go all crazy around women. Come to think of it, Isabelle said she didn’t care a whole lot for gentlemen. She said they were usually so dull they caused their wives to cast longing glances at young cowhands.”

“I’ve got to meet your Isabelle.”

“I’m not too sure about that. If she ever finds out we slept in the same bed, she’ll kill you—assuming Zeke and Hawk don’t get to you first.”

“I’m safe. I couldn’t possibly get any sleep.”

“Because of me?”

“For a woman with ten brothers, you are a strange combination of knowledge and naïveté.”

“What do you mean?”

“You talk about men responding to women like it’s old news, yet you seem surprised I can respond to you. You aren’t at all embarrassed, either. You act like it’s an ordinary topic of conversation.”

“I guess that comes from being reared with so many brothers.”

“Somebody forgot an important part of your education. Drive a man too far, and he becomes an animal.”

“Are you going to turn into an animal?”

“I’m trying hard not to, but if you don’t turn back around, I’m not going to make it.”

“But I don’t want to turn around.”

“Drew!” It was an anguished wail.

“Isabelle said when I fell in love, I’d like a man’s touch. I’d want him to touch me all the time. She said I wouldn’t threaten to shoot his ears off if he didn’t keep his distance.”

A convulsive shudder passed through Cole. It took a minute before he could control his voice enough to speak. “What else did Isabelle tell you?”

“She said I’d start thinking about pretty dresses and new ways to fix my hair. She said the best part of the day would come when I crawled into bed at night and he put his arms around me and held me close.”

Cole’s body trembled.

“Would you hold me close?” asked Drew.

“No.”

“Why?”

“Because I’m too excited.”

“How will that keep you from holding me close?”

“It won’t, not exactly, but it will get in the way.”

“I don’t mind.”

“But I do.”

“Isabelle said if a man loved a woman, he couldn’t wait to hold her close.”

“Isabelle was talking about a man and wife. You just said she’d kill me if she could see us now. She’d do something a whole lot worse if I do what I want to do more than anything else in the world.”

“What’s that?”

“Make love to you.” There, he’d said it. Now she’d understand. Now she’d back away and give him a chance to hold on to his honor.

“Isabelle said I’d like that most of all.”

Cole groaned, and felt the last of his control vanish. He put his arms around Drew and pulled her to him.

Chapter Twenty-one

Drew heard her words with as much surprise as Cole must have felt. She had practically asked him to make love to her. As much as that shocked her, it didn’t frighten her. Rather, it seemed to release some kind of internal knot that allowed her body to relax into Cole’s arms. She was still terribly cold, but she could feel a small core of warmth come into being somewhere deep inside her.

“This is a little awkward,” Cole said. “On the physical side, we’ve skipped all the preliminary steps and gone straight to being naked in bed together. On the emotional side, we haven’t even started.”

Drew had never planned to let any man make love to her. But she hadn’t expected it to be so complicated. From what her brothers said, it was quick and straightforward. But her brothers had been a lot younger then, and she wasn’t sure they had had as much experience as they boasted of.

“What are we supposed to do?” she asked.

Cole laughed. “I don’t believe this is happening.”

“What’s wrong?”

“Everything. But I’m going to do my best to change that. I’m going to start by kissing you. You like it when I kiss you, don’t you?”

“Yes.”

It felt strange to be lying in bed with Cole, something she’d never expected to do with any man. It felt even more peculiar to be naked and kissing, but Drew decided it wasn’t bad. Unusual, but not bad at all. She really liked it when Cole kissed her. It was hard to explain why something as simple as pressing their lips together could make her world spin into a new orbit, but everything seemed different with Cole. Now she had even more reason to like kissing him. He loved her enough to risk his life to save hers. She knew she was probably dwelling on that too much, but how could any woman think about such a sacrifice too much?

When it caused her not to pay attention to the man who was holding her in his arms, who was kissing her, who was awakening in her body sensations she’d never experienced before.

One hand cupped her cheek as he kissed her gently, then more hungrily. His other hand cupped her breast. No one had touched her breasts. She was unprepared to find her skin so sensitive to his touch. She flinched when his thumb touched her nipple. The intensity of the sensation startled her.

“Did I hurt you?” Cole asked.

She shook her head, then recaptured his lips, greedy for the sweetness of their shared kisses. Isabelle had said she’d like it, but she hadn’t said it would practically revolutionize Drew’s whole way of thinking about men. She’d never thought they were all that necessary, but if they couldn’t do anything else, she decided kissing was enough reason to keep them around.

She wanted to move closer to Cole, to press her body against his, but he kept her at a distance, his hands between them. Both were on her breasts, causing a new explosion of sensation. Cole’s touch had opened the lid on the Pandora’s box of her feelings, letting escape a world of sensations, feelings, experiences she’d never encountered. She began to understand why most of the women she knew talked about men as though they were an essential part of their existence. She would find it very difficult to face the rest of her life knowing she’d never be kissed again, that no man’s hand would touch her body, make her skin burn with the heat of desire.

Cole broke their kiss. Her unhappiness was forgotten the moment she felt his lips touch her nipple. She thought she would rise straight up from the bed. Her breath caught in her throat, then poured forth in a torrent. Her body tensed, each muscle as rigid as dried sinew. Heat shot through her, driving out the cold that until now had held firm possession of her body. She felt like a banked fire, glowing hotter and hotter from the burning embers deep within.

The tension throughout her body built to such a level she couldn’t stand it any longer. She pulled Cole’s lips from her breast and recaptured his mouth with her own. She couldn’t stand to keep her distance from him any longer. She wanted to feel the warmth of his skin, the hardness of his body. She wanted to wrap herself around him like a vine. She threw herself against him, only to discover the reason he’d kept them slightly apart.