When a Texan Gambles (20 page)

She reminded herself that she wasn’t afraid of him, but a naked man, angry and staring at her, was more than her limit of bravery.

He took a step toward her, flinging water off his wet body as he moved. He reminded her of a wild animal. Powerful, strong, sure of his movements.

Sarah closed her eyes, hoping he would vanish.

When she opened them once more, he was still moving closer. She backed up a step and turned away.

“Sarah? Look at me.”

She shook her head. She didn’t want to look at him, even though a part of her found his strong body fascinating. There was nothing soft in the make of him. He seemed all muscle and bone. Like a magnificent animal standing proud and tall before her.

“Sarah.” He lowered his voice. “Look at me.”

“No.” She hiccupped. “You don’t have any clothes on.”

“You’ve seen me undressed before. I don’t think it would be anything new to you. After all, besides the doctoring you must have helped with, you’ve been married twice now and you’re not a child bride.”

She forced herself to meet his stare. “I never saw Mitchell, not naked, not once in the year we were married.” She wanted to scream that her first husband had nothing to do with how she felt when she looked at Sam, but she wasn’t sure she had enough words to make him understand.

Sam let out a long sigh. “I had no idea you found nudity so repulsive. After all, you are not fully dressed yourself.” He reached for the thick wool man’s dressing gown in the open wardrobe and pulled it on. Then he retrieved a white robe with rosebuds embroidered across the collar for her. After wrapping it around her shoulders, he stepped back a few feet and folded his arms. “There, we’re both dressed. Will you answer a question for me now?”

Sarah wiggled into the sleeves of her garment and let her towel fall to the floor. “All right.” She wanted to tell him he looked strange in the robe far too small for his frame, but she was afraid he might take it off again. “What would you like to talk about?” She faced him.

He smiled. “Were you teasing me just now?”

She lifted her head, but didn’t bother to lie. “Maybe. A little. Sometimes you act like you forget I’m a woman.”

Closing the distance between them, he stood near. “I may forget a lot of things, Mrs. Garrett, but the fact that you are a woman is not one of them.”

He didn’t reach for her, or bend to kiss her. He simply stood near. Very, very near.

“I thought my name was Mrs. Gatlin?” she whispered, breathing in the fresh smell of him. Tiny droplets of water clung to the hair on his chest not covered by the robe.

“What do you want of me?” he asked so quietly no one could have heard his words even if they had been in the room. “If I come too close, you push me away. If I stay away, you tease me to come closer.”

Sarah looked up at him, feeling the warmth of his gaze on her face. “I don’t want anything.”

“Answer me, Sarah. I don’t want to play a game.”

She lifted her chin. He was right. But admitting what she wanted might be far more dangerous than playing any game. “I want you to hold me. Just hold me,” she corrected. She hated admitting her weakness to him. Everything about him was strong. Sarah couldn’t imagine him ever admitting to needing anyone.

“All my life I’ve felt like I’ve been begging for someone to hold me.” She wanted no lie, no pretence between them. “No one ever has. I just thought that you might if you found me desirable.”

Gently he moved one arm around her waist and the other against the back of her knees. He lifted her into his arms and cradled her there as if what he carried were priceless.

“I’ll hold you, Sarah, if that’s what you want. But I can only hold you as a man holds a woman. Don’t ask me to do this as just your friend.”

Sarah’s heart pounded in rapid fire against her chest. She nodded once. He had a right to set a few of the rules. He’d honored hers.

“And when I’m finished”—his words brushed against her ear—“you’ll have no doubts about my finding you desirable.”

He walked past the bed to an overstuffed chair placed near the fire. He brought her into the folds of the velvet chair as he sat down.

For a long while, neither said a word. She leaned her head against his shoulder, and his strong arms wrapped around her.

Finally he kissed the top of her head and asked, “Is this what you wanted, Sarah?”

“Yes,” she answered. “Thank you.”

She stretched slightly and brushed her mouth across his lips. “I’m sorry about the other night,” she whispered. “I know you weren’t attacking me.”

He didn’t move as she continued to brush light kisses across his lips as she talked.

“I was frightened and angry and a little hurt.”

His hesitance excited her far more than any advance he could have made. She moved her fingers through the course straight strands of his hair while her bottom lip brushed across his cheek. She loved the feel of this man, the taste of him, the smell of him.

“I’m not afraid of you,” she whispered against his ear. “Just let me be a woman around you, Sam.”

He closed his eyes and leaned his head back.

Sarah took his silence as agreement. She spread her hand out at the base of his neck and pushed the robe open. “I don’t find you repulsive. Shocking maybe, but never repulsive. I guess because I doctored you, I feel like, in a small way, you belong to me.”

When he didn’t answer, she let her fingers comb through the hair of his chest. She saw Mitchell a few times in his longhandles and once without a shirt, but he dressed in the darkness before dawn and expected his privacy at his bath. He considered bare flesh not only indecent, but unhealthy. She had never even wanted to know what he looked like without clothes, and he had shown no interest in seeing her.

Sam was different. She’d seen his body and wondered what it would feel like to touch him. And with each touch her curiosity grew.

She liked the way Sam’s muscles tightened as her palm spread across his chest. Mitchell had been someone who came along when she needed a home. He’d never cared enough about her to talk to her more then necessary, much less argue with her. He placed little value in her. Sarah would stake her life on the fact that if Mitchell had been standing in the rain the night the sheriff raffled her off, he wouldn’t have bothered to bid. He’d got her for free when Granny died, and that had been her worth to him.

But Sam never treated her as though she were worthless. He might have been the one who paid the money, but in a small way he belonged to her. She’d patched him up, helped him escape more than once, and argued with him across half the state. He might claim to be the meanest man in Texas, but he protected her. She knew without a doubt that this scarred, powerful man would put himself between a bullet and her.

Sam’s hand covered hers, putting an end to her exploring.

She looked up into his dark eyes as he raised her hand and kissed her palm. Her fingers trembled when his lips moved to her wrist. She felt his kiss on her skin with each pounding of her pulse. The gentle action by the hard man surprised her.

He opened his mouth and traced across her wrist with his tongue. His head was down. Dark hair covered his face, but she knew he enjoyed himself. When she shuddered, he pulled her closer against his chest and continued.

“Sam,” she said out of breath.

He looked at her without letting go of her hand. “Do you want me to stop?”

“No,” she answered. “Please don’t.”

“Close your eyes,” he whispered. “Let go of the fear, Sarah. I’m not going to hurt you. I swear. I only want to touch you.”

The warmth from her bath and the heat from his body relaxed her into the softness of the chair.

She floated as his hand moved along her thigh, creating a longing for more with each stroke. The dampness of his hair brushed against her throat as he kissed just below her ear. A delicious warmth spread through her as his hand skimmed across the soft robe.

She felt as if he were treasuring the feel of her, worshipping the fact that she was so near, so soft in his embrace.

Sarah dug her fingers into his hair as his hands moved up to her shoulders. He pulled her closer, pressing her breasts against his chest as his fingers slid over her back. She wanted to purr like a cat and stretch to his touch. Each time she moved, even slightly, Sam stroked her once more, gently molding her body.

The moments passed by with the ticking of an old clock on the mantel. Minute by minute, touch by touch, she grew accustomed to him until finally she did as he’d asked and floated into a peaceful paradise. There was danger in trusting him, compared to the starvation of loneliness if she did not.

He pulled her close suddenly, as though he had to hold her tight. She rested against the pounding of his heart as his hands moved slowly down her back. She smiled and buried her face into his throat so that he could feel as well as hear her soft cries of pleasure.

She didn’t stir when his kiss lowered to her throat. The clean smell of his hair filled her lungs as he crossed beneath her chin to continue his journey. Now the slightest pressure of his hand or nudge of his head moved her as though they were dancers knowing each other’s steps. She felt liquid in his arms, flowing in waves to the rhythm of his heartbeat.

His hand cradled her head and raised her lips to his mouth. His kiss teased her until she smiled. This was what she’d longed for and hadn’t known how to describe. Sarah felt cherished, loved, and desirable.

His kiss deepened. His caress grew bolder across the thin fabric of her robe. The reminder to stop him from touching her intimately passed as no more than a fleeting thought amid the shower of sensations washing over her.

She shifted, allowing his hand to move from her waist to cup her hip. His breath grew suddenly ragged against her throat as his fingers tightened over her flesh.

“Is this what you wanted?” he asked.

His mouth tickled along her skin and his warm breath spread down her throat. “Do you feel like a woman now?”

“Yes,” she answered thinking that she’d spent a lifetime longing for such closeness. “Thank you.”

She felt his laughter more than heard it. “You’re welcome,” he mumbled as he nibbled on her throat.

He pressed her against him and held her so close she matched her breathing with his. She drifted to sleep feeling safe, cherished.

Sam watched her in the firelight. Her robe gapped open and the light clearly defined her breasts. He studied the shadows dancing across her skin. Without a doubt she was the most beautiful creature God ever made. He moved his hand along the flesh at her waist and slowly upward to just below her breast. The soft mound pushed against his finger, daring him to journey further.

She was his, he reminded himself. She was his in the eyes of man and God. He could touch her anywhere he pleased. He had every right, and right now he had more desire for her than he’d ever felt for a woman.

But he wanted her willing in his arms. Not asleep. Never forced or tricked, or worse, out of duty. He wanted her wanting him. He wanted to build a need within her so great for him that she cried out his name in longing. He didn’t want to be only a husband or a man for Sarah. He wanted to be the only man Sarah would ever want.

He lowered his hand and pulled the robe over her breasts. Then he leaned and kissed her gently. Her mouth opened to his request even in her sleep. Her lips were full and ripe from their earlier explorations. She sighed as he tasted her one last time before he carried her to her bed and covered her.

At the doorway to the drawing room, he turned and watched her sleep for a while. She brought a peace to his life. A peace he’d never known.

Hours later Sarah opened one eye. He was gone. The tub remained, the fire cold in the hearth.

She grinned and cuddled deep into the covers, thinking she’d like to sleep the day away. But then, just as she drifted back into sleep, she smelled something.

Coffee.

Sarah rolled over and noticed that the table by the window had been covered with a white cloth. Huge dishes with shiny lids were stacked atop it.

Bacon?

She managed to crawl from the covers and tiptoe closer. Carefully she opened one lid. Biscuits.

She opened another. Bacon and eggs.

Another. Jams.

“Sam!” she yelled as she opened more with baked fruit and tiny sweets like she’d never seen. “Sam!”

“What?” he asked as he hurried around the door from the drawing room. “Is something the matter?”

Sarah glanced at him tucking a crisp white shirt into dark pants. “Sam. You’ll never believe this. Someone has left all this food in our room.”

His shoulders relaxed. “I know. I ordered breakfast hours ago but wanted to wait until you woke.”

She pulled a chair to the tiny table. “I’m starving.”

“So am I,” he answered, but when she glanced up he was looking at her and not the food.

SIXTEEN