Brandon.
A film of cold perspiration broke out on her body. Images sprang at her from the past, of that never-forgotten afternoon when Brandon and his friends had jumped her. Because she had so little Indian blood and was tawny-haired with blue eyes, they had considered her a prize.
Looking up at Jake Rand’s dark countenance, she couldn’t help but wonder if he might not have an equally dark side to his nature. Under all his layers of polish, did he harbor wicked yearnings that he had never dared to reveal? She found that difficult to believe, but she knew some men could disguise the blackest of intentions with gentle words and charming demeanors.
“Are you getting any of the warmth?” he asked. “You can come a little closer if you like. I don’t bite all that hard.”
Dignity. Her father had made it sound so easy, but it wasn’t. “I—I’m really not cold.”
His voice laced with amused tolerance, he said, “Really. Then why are you shivering?”
“Am I?” She clasped her hands behind her and dug her fingernails into her flesh. The pain gave her something to focus on. “Perhaps I am a little chilly.”
His eyes, warm and twinkling in the firelight, delved deeply into hers. Indigo tried to see into him, but it was as if he had drawn curtains so she couldn’t look too deeply. Why would he do that if he had nothing to hide? Her trepidation mounted.
After a long, torturous moment, he lifted a hand to her hair. His touch felt weightless and unbelievably gentle. He plunged his long fingers into the strands and gripped the back of her neck to draw her toward him.
“Indigo, are you frightened?”
“Of w-what?”
Jake nearly chuckled at that. She was obviously frightened. It was also obvious that her pride would never allow her to admit it. Though her fears were groundless, he could see they didn’t seem so to her, and he had to admire her pluck. No maidenly tears to gain a reprieve. No pleading. She stood before him, clearly determined to accept her fate. Rather like a Joan of Arc, he mused, which made him feel a little exasperated. He wasn’t her executioner, after all.
Her show of bravado had the perverse effect of emphasizing her lack of stature. He had never known anyone so determined to lead with her chin when she had so little bulk as backup. Why did she stand there, head lifted in proud defiance, refusing to let her gaze waver from his?
The compassion he felt for her in no way dampened his desire. From the first instant he set eyes on her, he had wanted her. Now she was his. It was a heady feeling. All he had to do was lift her in his arms and carry her to bed. As unenthusiastic as she clearly was, he didn’t think she would struggle, which was all to the good. With a little gentleness and patience, he could coax her to relax, and once she did . . .
His pulse quickened as he pictured himself peeling away her clothing like the skin from a delectable piece of fruit. Indigo—a curious combination of innocence and sensuality, trepidation and dauntless courage.
Not wishing to prolong her agony, he tightened his hold on the back of her neck and leaned toward her. Her scent, a blend of rose hips and fresh-scrubbed skin, intoxicated him. He bent his head and feathered his lips against her hair. Such perfection, and all of it his. Had he truly been reluctant when he offered to marry her?
He heard her breath snag in her throat. A shudder ran through her body, and she made fists in his shirt as if to hold herself erect. Nuzzling his way, Jake found the velvety slope of her throat with his mouth. Closing his eyes, he tasted her skin. His imagination hadn’t done her justice; she was far sweeter than he dreamed. An electrical shock of white- hot need shot through him. Focused on that, he slipped his other arm around her.
She arched against him like a drawn bowstring, so taut he feared she might break if he tightened his embrace. He couldn’t hear her breathing. But he could hear her heart—a wild thrumming that spoke eloquently of terror. Jake froze. This was far more than a maidenly case of jitters, surely. Not that he was an expert in handling virgins. Maybe all women reacted this way when they faced their first experience with a man.
He splayed his hand on her back, assailed by a wave of guilt when he felt the frantic flutter of her pulse throbbing into his fingertips.
“Indigo . . .” Uncertain what he meant to say, what he could say, he simply held her.
“Wh-what?”
The sound of her quavery voice made him ache for her. That damnable Comanche pride of hers. If she was this frightened, why didn’t she simply say so? He certainly wouldn’t think less of her for it. Was this an after-effect of her experience with Brandon Marshall and his friends? What had the bastards done?
Abruptly, he straightened. Pulled off balance, she leaned full-length against him, still clutching his shirt. Jake cupped her small face between his hands.
“Indigo . . .” Feathering his thumbs along her cheekbones, he said, “Honey, I’m not going to hurt you.” The words no sooner passed his lips than he realized they weren’t true; he would hurt her this first time. “No more than I can help, at any rate.”
He winced at the way that sounded. Why, when he most wanted to say exactly the right thing, did he always bungle it? She made no response, but words weren’t necessary. The dread he saw in her wide blue eyes made him want to kick himself.
Taking a deep draft of air, he said, “Would you like to talk for a while?”
She blinked. “Talk?”
Jake nearly smiled at the disbelief that crossed her face. “Yes, talk. We haven’t had a lot of time for that.”
“All right. About what?”
“Uh . . .” He set her away from him, then held her erect until he felt certain she had her balance. “The weather?”
She rewarded him with a high-pitched little laugh that sounded more hysterical than amused.
Jake’s mind raced. There had to be a hundred subjects they could discuss. That was the problem, wasn’t it? They scarcely knew each other. He came up with nothing. With the bedroom looming only a few feet away, he doubted she would be able to concentrate on a conversation anyway.
“I don’t suppose your aunt Amy kept any games here, did she?”
“G-games?”
“A deck of cards, some dice.” He repositioned a log in the fire with the toe of his boot, then glanced up. “I’m not really ready for bed yet. Are you?”
Her poorly concealed relief nearly made him smile again. That would be a fatal mistake. She might think he was laughing at her, and that was the last thing he wanted.
“N-no! I’m not the least bit tired.” He could almost see her gathering the threads of her composure. “A game?” Her eyes brightened. “How about checkers?”
Jake hadn’t played in years, and he never had particularly enjoyed the game. “Bring it on.”
She nearly tripped over her own feet in her eagerness to find it. Jake hauled in two straight-backed chairs from the kitchen and positioned them at the table. When she emerged from the hall with the board, he moved the lantern aside to make room. Straddling his chair, he watched as she set up the game.
“Which do you choose, red or black?” she asked.
“Red.” For unrequited passion.
She perched on the edge of her chair and carefully laid out the pieces. Her hands shook. As Jake watched her, a feeling of tenderness welled within him.
“You move first,” she offered.
He moved out with a red disc, determined, for her sake, to concentrate on the game. Thirty minutes later, she had soundly trounced him. When she seized his last piece, she lifted wide blue eyes to his and said with obvious hopefulness, “The best two out of three?”
With a suppressed chuckle, he said, “I don’t suppose you’d care to sweeten the pot with a little wager.”
“I haven’t any money.”
“There are other stakes.” He was thinking in terms of the loser forfeiting a kiss, but when he noted her wary expression, he said, “The winner gets to be served coffee in bed every morning for a week.”
“I don’t d
rink coffee.”
“Hot cocoa for you, coffee for me.”
“You’re on.”
Jake resigned himself to a long night. She was as nervous as a mouse in a roomful of cats, which didn’t make for stimulating conversation. To sharpen his interest in the game, he pretended that the person who lost their wager had to forfeit an article of clothing, winner’s choice. After several minutes of consideration, he determined that he would select her blouse. Remembering their first meeting and how she had looked in the soaked doeskin, he had little difficulty in imagining her nude from the waist up. His skill at checkers took a dramatic upturn, and he prevailed in the next two games.
When he executed the last killing blow and looked across the board at his opponent, he saw why he had won so easily. She was drooping with exhaustion, blue eyes bleary, her silken lashes aflutter in a hopeless struggle to stay awake.
“I guess we’d better call it a night,” he said.
Her eyes opened wide, and she jerked herself erect. He couldn’t have elicited a swifter response if he had jabbed her with a pin. “One more game, please? I deserve a chance to even the score.”
Against his better judgment, Jake agreed. At the back of his mind hovered a purely selfish motivation. Maybe, if he wore her out, she’d be so exhausted by the time he took her to bed she wouldn’t have the energy to be frightened.
No such luck. At the end of their fourth game, which he won, he had only to look at the rapid pulsebeat in the hollow of her throat to know that all her senses had revived to fine working order. Regardless, he was checkered out. This couldn’t go on all night.
He pushed up from the chair. “Would you like a few minutes before I follow you in?” he asked, gesturing toward the bedroom.
“A few minutes for what?”
He stared down at her. The puzzlement in her eyes was genuine, he felt certain. In a voice tight with suppressed laughter, he said, “To get ready for bed.”
She threw a horrified glance toward the dark hallway. “Oh.” She dragged her gaze back to his. “I—Yes, that would be nice.”
“Would you like to take the lamp?”
“No, that’s all right.”
As she walked toward the bedroom, Jake leaned a hip against the table and folded his arms across his chest. Cocking his head, he listened. The sound of a drawer being opened rasped through the stillness. He sighed and applied himself to counting the planks in the floor that ran from the wall to the braided sitting room rug.
When he felt he had given her plenty of time, he turned out the lantern and, guided by its diminishing glow, picked his way toward the bedroom. The smell of vanilla wafted to his nostrils as he stepped through the doorway. Indigo stood before the open window, her only armor a floor-length flannel nightgown. She hugged herself, as if to ward off the chill. She looked so young and defenseless. He moved slowly toward her.
As he settled his hands on her rigid shoulders, he abandoned all hope of lovemaking. A coldhearted bastard, he wasn’t. He drew her against his chest and leaned forward to see her face. Her forlorn expression suggested that she was searching for something or someone in the darkness outside. He followed her gaze and studied the shifting shadows. A storm was blowing in. Looming black clouds hovered in the sky. The wind buffeted the house and whistled softly beneath the eaves.
Resigned, Jake guided her gently to the bed. She was trembling, from cold or nerves, he didn’t know. He glanced back at the open window, thought about closing it, and then remembered her habit of leaving the window in her room open for Lobo. Despite the chill, he didn’t have the heart to close it.
Tugging back the bedding, he gave her a nudge. With a notable lack of eagerness, she slipped between the crisp sheets. He glimpsed a flash of muslin and realized she was wearing her bloomers under her nightgown. Her chemise, too, no doubt. His bride, the temptress.
He unbuttoned his shirt, conscious with every flick of his fingers that she stared up at him, her eyes luminescent spheres of silver-blue in the moonlit shadows. He dropped his hands to his belt. She rolled to face the wall. Sitting on the edge of the bed, he unlaced his boots and jerked them off. The pants followed. He hesitated and then decided to leave on his knit underdrawers. There was little point in shocking her with total nudity when he couldn’t put it to good use.
He stretched out on his side, pulled the bedding over himself, and studied her narrow back. She was still shivering. He pressed closer and settled a hand on the curve of her hip. At his touch, she jerked.
“You’re cold,” he said.
“N-no, n-not really.”
There was a lump on Jake’s side of the mattress. He shifted toward her to get off of it. “I’ve slept in better beds.”
He slid his palm to her belly. She lay absolutely motionless. He bent his knees and drew her against him, so her bottom rested in the cradle of his thighs. Warmth cocooned around them, yet she still shivered.
“There’s nothing to be afraid of, Indigo.”
“I-I’m not afraid.”
Her hair was draped across his pillow. He turned his cheek against its silkiness. God, she felt so good. He closed his eyes and willed his body not to react. Her soft butt pressing against him was sheer torture. With grim determination, he kept his hand where it was, even though he ached to cup her breast. What a hell of a way to start a marriage.
For some reason, thoughts of Mary Beth filled his mind. In ways, Indigo was a lot like her. Jake tried to imagine his headstrong sister thrust into this situation, married against her wishes to a man she scarcely knew. If that happened, it would be Jake’s hope that the man would be understanding and take his time gentling her. That being the case, how could Jake do less?
Indigo felt Jake’s arm relax and grow heavy. She held her breath and listened as the rhythm of his breathing altered. Was he asleep? She couldn’t be so lucky.
His hand rested on her midriff, his fingertips touching the underside of her breast. Even through a double layer of muslin and flannel, the warmth of him seared her. She lay there in the clutches of panic, afraid he’d move.
Memories flashed, and she squeezed her eyes closed, trying to black them out. Brandon, his friends, the dizzying feeling of horror she had felt when the five of them had converged on her. She didn’t want to be touched like that again.
Jake stirred, and her heart leaped. He murmured something against her hair. Feeling as if she might suffocate, she lay there and waited for him to do something—what, she wasn’t certain. Remembering Franny’s advice, she tried feverishly to conjure images of Lobo and daisies. The pictures flitted in and out at the edges of her mind.
Minutes dragged by. Then he began to snore. His robust breaths stirred her hair and misted the back of her scalp with warmth. He was asleep, really and truly asleep. She couldn’t believe it. Why? The question circled endlessly in her head. He had intended to take her; she had read that in his eyes.
She stared at the wall, quite certain she would never be able to rest. When he didn’t move or touch her in any other way, she started to relax a little. Her eyelids immediately grew heavy. She drifted for a while, vaguely aware, still not trusting him enough to totally let down her guard.
In the black of night, Jake awoke to a nagging ache in his side. Slowly surfacing to consciousness, he became aware by degrees. For a moment, he had no idea where he was. Then he identified the warm softness against his back, a woman’s body. Startled, he opened his eyes. A slender arm was flung over his waist. He stared into the darkness. Then he smiled.
Indigo. . . . In his sleep, he had turned his back to her. In hers, she had lost her inhibitions. He could feel her cheek crushed against his shoulder blade, her silken hair on his skin.
The discomfort that had interrupted his rest persisted. He recalled the lump he had felt in the mattress and realized he was lying on it. He tried to move, but Indigo murmured in her sleep and tightened her arm around him. He smiled again and imagined the expression that would cross her face if she woke up and reali
zed how friendly she had become.
As much as he hated to conclude their cuddling, he wasn’t going to get much sleep lying on the lump. Prying her arm from around him, he eased forward and succeeded only in transferring the discomfort to another spot. Damned if it didn’t feel like something was poking him.
Slipping quietly from the bed, Jake slid a hand under the mattress to see if a section of the bed ropes had broken. His fingers encountered a length of board supported by the ropes. His hand curled around something large, cold and rough-surfaced. What the—He pulled it out. A rock?
Disgruntled, he set it on the bedside table, pulled the board out, and crawled back into bed. As if she had missed his warmth, Indigo snuggled up against him. Jake, never one to refuse a lady, welcomed her with open arms. She settled her head in the hollow of his shoulder and angled a bent leg across his thighs. Unable to resist, Jake slid a hand along her hip and slender thigh, tugged up her nightgown, and settled a hand on her knee. Bloomers. He grinned and fell back to sleep.
Chapter 11
THE FOLLOWING MORNING, JAKE WOKE UP to the smell of coffee. He pried open his eyes to see Indigo bent over him, holding a mug. With an uncertain smile, she said, “Our wager, remember?”
Jake flashed a sleepy grin and came up on one elbow to take the cup. Eyeing her over the rim, he indulged in a slow sip, aware, even through the haze of drowsiness, that she moved quickly away from him, as if she feared he might grab her. He was going to like waking up to her sweet face every morning, he decided. Even in her grubby old leathers, she was beautiful. He much preferred her hair loose, but with her delicate bone structure, she was every bit as lovely with the thick braid coiled at the crown of her head.
“I must have died,” he said in a hoarse voice. Throwing a look at the rock he had removed from beneath him, he added, “It’s not easy to sleep with a boulder poking you in the ribs. I wonder why your aunt and uncle had it under the mattress?”