Mustang Annie (23 page)

“Have you ever shaved a man before?”

Perfectly arced eyebrows shot upward. “Do I
look
like a woman who has never shaved a man?”

Put that way, shaving was no doubt a drop in the bucket of services she offered.

She did that thing with her lip again, and the images that arose in Jesse's mind would have made even the bawdiest harlot blush. His skin became suddenly overly sensitive to the water, his senses acute to the woman beside him. The rasp of steel scraping away beard and her gentle breaths were the only sounds in the room.

Normally he avoided bedding saloon girls. He knew the kind of men who paraded in and out of their beds each night, and had no desire to take with him any souvenirs gained from a few minutes of pleasure.

So his swift, gripping desire to bed this one struck him as odd—and a little unsettling.

It had to be the whiskey dulling his wits—not her sweet, fresh fragrance, so out of place among the pervading smells of spice and whiskey and sweat. Not the glossy black curls piled atop her head. Not the beads of bath water dotting her skin.

Closing his eyes, Jess forced himself to concentrate on something other than Honesty. He'd just about succeeded when her soft cry echoed through the room.

“Oh, my lands . . . !”

His lids slowly lifted. He found her staring at him through eyes wide with astonishment. “What?”

“You're beautiful!”

The remark shouldn't have sent a spear of pleasure through his chest. It sounded far too feminine, and brought back the derogatory names thrown at him all his life by his own gender. Angel-face, pretty boy, buttercup . . . And those were the polite ones.

She swiftly busied herself with wiping cream off his face. “I expect people tell you that all the time.”

“Not if they want to live.” And not exactly in that manner. But as Jess had gotten older, he'd learned to close his ears to the names and use his looks to his own advantage: women seemed to appreciate them, and men were so busy underestimating him that they never realized how much danger they were in until it was too late.

But strangely enough, when Honesty said it, instead of feeling that familiar surge of resentment, he'd felt a surge of power—as if she could pay him no higher a compliment. Hell, for all he knew, it could be part of her “routine.” All harlots had one; some were just better than others.

Honesty was infinitely better than most, he decided when her hand delved beneath the water and her fingertips grazed his hips. He couldn't decide if it was a move designed to arouse him, or an innocent mis-aim. Either way, hot blood centered in his groin. He seized her hand under the water. “Do you tend to all your customers so thoroughly?

She blinked. “Rose said to oblige your every whim.”

His every whim, huh?

A wicked grin tugged at his mouth. What the hell was wrong with him, anyway? When a man found himself stranded with a beautiful, willing woman, he shouldn't complain; he should fall on his knees and thank the gods.

So what if he didn't have time for the distraction? After two months of diligent tracking, he deserved a night off. And if that night included being pleasured by the prettiest harlot this side of the Rockies, he'd consider himself richly rewarded.

“Honesty?”

She swallowed heavily. “Yes?”

“I've got a whim that needs obliging.” He dragged her hand to his shaft. Blue eyes widened in alarm, and for a moment Jess wondered how much experience she had in pleasing a man. She looked as if she'd never touched one before.

Then her fingers tightened around him and he couldn't think at all.

“My, my, that's quite a loaded weapon you're packin',” she drawled in that red-velvet voice.

Jesse inhaled sharply. “You keep touchin' me like that and it won't stay loaded long.”

Her lashes fell and she licked her lips. The sight of her pink tongue sliding across the seam of ripe flesh proved his undoing. With a half growl, half-groan, he cupped his hand around the back of her neck and dragged her face down to his.

The instant their lips met, sensations swirled through Honesty in kaleidoscopic colors—the blue of desire, red of fire, purple of need. . . .

As his tongue delved into her mouth, she thrust back, tasting whiskey and soap and man . . . oh, so much man. And as the shock of him filling her palm wore off, it gave way to glory. Honesty whimpered, suddenly unable to get enough of him. Her hand moved up his stiff organ, past the soft hair that nestled the core of him to a stomach rigid with muscle, then glided up to the tight wall of his chest. How could she ever have thought him scrawny? Lean, yes, but hardly scrawny. There was no mistaking the solid muscle beneath her fingers.

“Damn, but you taste sweet,” he murmured against her lips.

Dizzy from his assault on her mouth, Honesty's head felt too heavy to support and fell back. He seemed to take that as an invitation to blaze a hot path down her neck with his mouth. Her limbs turned to liquid, her blood to lava. Her breathing grew so ragged she feared she would faint.

“Your skin is so soft. . . .”

And his was so . . . hot. Honesty knew she'd go up in flames if he kept this up.

She'd die if he stopped.

Only when his hand slipped under her skirt and slid past her stockings, over her garters to her bare thigh, did she come to her senses.

Breathless, she pulled back, knowing if she didn't put some distance between herself and this tub full of temptation, she'd never regain control of the situation. “How about if we take this to drier ground?” she suggested in a ragged whisper.

Eyes impossibly thick-lashed and so green they'd have put jade to shame studied her with a twinkle of mischief. “Don't tell me you're afraid of getting a little wet?” he dared.

Honesty pushed away from him with a strength she wouldn't have believed herself capable of, and hastened on weak-kneed legs to table. She pressed her hand against her breast, closed her eyes, and released a slow, pent-up breath. This had gone much too far.

She slipped a trembling hand inside her skirt pocket, where she kept the “secret to a man's greatest pleasure.” The packet had come in handy more times than Honesty cared to remember. “Would you care for another drink?” she asked, half amazed that she could even talk.

“I've had enough, thanks.”

“Well, I haven't. And I think there's a rule somewhere that a lady isn't supposed to drink alone.”

She poured them both a glass of whiskey from the bottle brought up earlier, then watered down the contents in her glass. She'd never had much tolerance for spirits, and getting soused would defeat her purpose.

Then she unfolded the packet and lifted it to the rim of his glass. Instead of pouring the powder into his drink, though, she paused, tempted for a moment to toss it aside. To take what he offered and to hell with the consequences.

Then Deuce's face appeared before her, with laughing Scottish eyes and stern father's mouth, and she knew she had no choice.

Honestly pressed her lips tightly together and quickly finished her task. When she turned around, she nearly dropped their drinks.

Jesse stood in a ray of setting sunlight in all his naked glory. Every inch of his tall, bronzed body was corded with sinew. With the grime washed away, his hair was the light blond of a sunbeam. Darker brows arched above eyes the color of spring grass, and a slight indentation channeled from the straight-bridged nose to a set of perfect, perfect lips; the whole masterpiece was framed by a sculpted jaw. She hadn't imagined he'd turn out like this!

Speechlessly, she watched him cross the room, flip the sheets over on the bed, and climb in. Seconds later he was propped against the headboard, arms winged behind his head, a devilish smile on his fallen-angel face, and wicked promise in eyes that glittered with a raw, aching need that matched the one pulsing through her veins.

Oh, lands, she was in trouble.

Aware that he was waiting, Honesty forced herself to walk to the bed. She handed him his glass of whiskey, lifted her own, and, hoping he never knew how dearly she regretted what she was about to do, proposed a toast: “To an unforgettable night.”

 

He couldn't remember a damn thing.

With his elbows propped on splayed knees, his head cupped in his hands, Jesse sat at the edge of the bed, naked as the day he was born. Around him, the scent of lilacs swirled erotically.

His gaze turned to the woman in his bed. Her hair fanned across the pillow slip, silky black tangles against pristine white. A vague image of burying his fingers in that hair stirred at the back of his memory, yet he couldn't quite grasp it.

She rolled onto her side. Her eyes were closed, her lashes casting a shadowed crescent on her cheekbones. Her lips curved into a smile of wistful bliss that had his gut knotting as she nuzzled the sheet as if inhaling its scent.

Abruptly she stilled. A frown creased her brow. Then she shot up off the bed, giving him nothing more than a glimpse of bare back and curvy bottom before snatching a blanket over her nudity. Eyes as wide and frantic as a stormy sea searched the room. “Oh my gosh,” she whispered. “Oh my
gosh
!”

Through bleary eyes, he watched her throw a wrinkled chemise over her head, then wriggle into a pair of ruffled pantaloons. Seeing her in the undergarments had as much an impact on him as the red corset he'd taken off her last night.

At least, he thought he'd taken it off her.

Jess frowned and strained to put the night in order in his mind. He distinctly remembered soft skin and hot kisses that could turn a man inside out. And he remembered laughing when Honesty spilled whiskey on his chest, then moaning when he made her lick it off. . . .

It got a little hazy after that. Nothing more than sensations of heat and dampness, and the most insane need to possess that Jesse had felt in his life.

The last thing he could recollect with any clarity was climbing atop her soft and willing body, feeling her arms wrap around his back and her legs around his waist, and hoping like hell to not explode the minute he buried himself inside her.

But then . . . nothing. Not even a glimmer to tell him what transpired next.

“What . . .” He licked his lips, then glanced around for something to get rid of the chalky taste in his mouth. There was half a glass of whiskey on the table. It tasted watered down and stale, but it was wet. “What happened last night?”

She paused in the act of tying her chemise to look at him. “Last night?”

Was it his imagination or did she look as confused as he felt?

“Yeah. Did we . . . you know . . . finish?”

“What kind of question is that? Of course we did!” She bustled about the room, plucking her dress off the chair and a petticoat from the floor. “Twice, in fact! We might have gone for a third time, except you had me so plumb wore out . . . well, let's just say that now that I know the extent of your talents, I'll be more prepared next time. Have you seen my shoe?”

Something about the way her words gushed out and she kept avoiding his eyes struck Jesse as odd, but his mind was too damned fuzzy to sort it out. How much had he drunk? Surely not enough to wipe his mind clean. Hell, he could out-drink an Irishman.

“Gosh, I can't believe I fell asleep in your bed. First time I've ever done that.”

It was the first time he'd ever
had
a woman fall asleep in his bed. That was one thing Jesse had always prided himself on—and what had always made him so good at his job—clearing himself of the scene before it became incriminating.

“By the way, you owe me three dollars.”

“Three dollars!” he cried, then immediately re gretted raising his voice when a thousand ice picks seemed to stab themselves behind his eyeballs.

“Surely you didn't expect a poke for free.”

No, but he expected to at least remember it. How did he know he'd been given his money's worth?

Yet how could he prove he hadn't?

“Aw, hell and damnation.” Jesse ripped his trousers off the floor and plunged his hand into the front pocket. Pulling out a handful of coins, he blinked, then narrowed his eyes. Was this all he had left?

She snatched the required amount from his hand so fast his head spun, then dropped the coins into the valley between her breasts before heading for the door. She paused with her hand on the knob. “Thanks, cowboy. You really were incredible.”

At least one of us enjoyed it.

Copyright

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

 

 

AVON BOOKS

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Publishers

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Copyright © 2000 by Rachelle Nelson

Excerpt from untitled teaser copyright © 2001 by Rachelle Nelson

ISBN: 0-380-80921-4

EPUB Edition AUGUST 2014 ISBN 9780062381446

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First Avon Books paperback printing: August 2000

 

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