Dark Paradise (44 page)

Her heart pounded at the idea. The tears burned her eyes.

She felt too vulnerable, too fragile. What she wanted suddenly was

passion hot enough to temper steel, hot enough to burn away the sense of

defenselessness and hopelessness.

Rising up on her toes, she cupped the back of J.D.'s head with one hand

and pulled him into the kiss, into her mouth. She kissed him deeply,

hungrily, wildly. The sparks struck and flared instantly. J.D. pulled

her against him, bending her back over his arm. He answered her

aggression with aggression, opening her mouth wider with the pressure of

his, thrusting his tongue deeper. His hand slipped between them, inside

the open front of her jacket, and found her breast. Kneading, squeezing,

fondling her through the soft fabric of the old chambray shirt she wore.

Then his fingers hooked in the jacket and the buttons gave way,

dropping to the deck like discarded pearls, skittering and rolling.

Marilee groaned as he captured her breast again. His hand was big,

broad, callused, and rough. His fingertips rubbed across the aching

point of her nipple, pinched it gently, drew on it. The fire of need

burned hotter within her. She felt strong, wild, giddy as she broke free

of the shroud of powerlessness. She had power, here, with him, within

herself, within these moments of mutual need.

Her hands wound into the fabric of his shirt, tugging it free of his

jeans, tugging it open snap by snap so she could touch him. She loved

touching him. The heat of his skin. The crisp silk of his chest hair.

The hard ridges of muscle and ribs. She felt drunk on it, on desire.

Dizzy.

Floating. Then she realized dimly that he had lifted her up.

He settled her on the glass-topped table. Laying her down, he opened her

jacket and shirt, baring her to the starlight. She stared up at him,

dreamy, drugged, her deep-set eyes glowing. J.D. forgot everything - what

she had been through, who she was, the terrible weariness that had

pressed down on him. There was only this.

Need. Uncomplicated. Simple. Sweet, hot desire. No games. No subterfuge.

just need. His need. Hers. She was not ashamed to want him. She reached

a hand up toward him, inviting him.

He bent over her and kissed her breasts, one and then the other. She

arched into the contact, encouraged him to taste her, to take the tender

bud of her nipple between his lips and suck her. J.D. granted her wishes as

his own. This was what he needed tonight. The solace of her body.

The comfort of having her take him inside her. He felt so raw, so tired

from the war he seemed to be waging on his own. He needed these moments

of wild abandon. He needed to be lost.

He crushed the fragile fabric of her skirt in his fists and pulled it up

into a drift across her waist. Too impatient to be civilized, he dealt

with her panties by tearing them free, shredding the lace with his bare

hands. Spurred on by the need, he parted her legs roughly and buried his

face against the hot moist flesh of her woman's body, ravenous for the

taste of her.

Marilee gasped his name, wound her fingers into his hair, and lifted her

hips to give him better access. He opened her with his fingers and

kissed her deeply, devouring her.

When the pleasure crested in a heavy wave, stars swam before her eyes,

and she couldn't tell if they were inside her head or in the big Montana

sky that stretched above them like a black velvet sea.

J.D. straightened away from her, panting, chest heaving. Marilee sat up

and reached for him, drew him to her.

She kissed him slowly, softly, deeply, savoring the taste of loving.

"I want you," he growled, kissing her lips, her cheek, the side of her

neck.

"I want you too," she answered back, her voice as faint as a dream. She

felt like a dream - her mind floating, her body throbbing, senses

magnified a thousand times. "I want you inside me."

"Then take what you want, Marilee," he murmured darkly, his hands

skimming down her sides.

Her fingers fumbled with his belt buckle, dealt with the button and

zipper of his jeans. They kissed again as she freed him. Frantically,

desperately. J.D. backed away from the table, drawing her with him. He

dropped down into one of the armless deck chairs, pulling Marilee onto

his lap, straddling him. Mouths locked, teeth clashed, tongues dueled.

Her hair tumbled forward across her cheeks and his, shrouding their

faces like a curtain of rumpled silk.

J.D. closed his big hands on her hips, lifted her, and pulled her down

on him, impaling her on his shaft.

Marilee's fingers dug into the steely muscles of his shoulders. She held

herself stiff for several exquisite moments while the line between

pleasure and pain blurred. Then slowly she began to move on him, riding

him, caressing him with her body, filling herself with him. The tempo

gained speed with every stroke, until they were both gasping, groping,

exploding. As the climax came in a white-hot rush for both of them, J.D.

crushed her in his embrace and she held on, riding out the storm of

sensation.

Afterward, she sank down against him, her arms looped around his neck.

She felt utterly spent, physically and mentally drained of all energy.

Her head was throbbing. Her skin was tingling. She had never felt so

wanton or so helpless in the aftermath. J.D. held her. His heart beat

strongly against her breast. She felt safe in the circle of his arms.

She wished the sensation would last forever, but she knew it wouldn't.

That knowledge lay like a rock in her heart.

"You all right?" His voice was a low purr.

"At the risk of sounding immodest," Marilee said, trying to stretch

humor over the vulnerability, "I thought I was better than all right."

"Mmm . . ." he growled, nuzzling the side of her throat. "Fishing for

compliments, Marilee?"

"If you don't want to use up your daily quota of adjectives, I'll settle

for a butter mint."

He chuckled and fished one out of his shirt pocket.

Their eyes locked as he slipped it into her mouth. Marilee caught hold

of his wrist and kissed his fingertip, then drew it between her lips and

sucked gently. J.D.'s nostrils flared. He was still buried deep inside

her. As their gazes heated and sparked, her body tightened around him.

Marilee shivered, not at the night air, but at the desperate need to

keep him with her - not just for a few moments of bliss, but much longer.

A time she wouldn't set a limit on even in the deepest corner of her

heart. She felt safe with him in a way that wasn't smart. She felt

complete in a way that she prayed was false. But tonight, when she was

feeling so beaten and so lost, she couldn't find the strength to let it

go.

"Stay the night," she whispered, terrified at the way the need made her

voice tremble.

J.D. stared at her, knowing this moment was more than he would have

allowed himself on any other night.

She wanted more than he could give. He needed her more than he would

ever admit.

Just tonight, he promised himself. It's just sex.

He didn't give the lie a chance to ring in his ears. He pushed past it

with a hundred excuses.

"Stay the night," she whispered.

J.D. lowered his mouth toward hers, his heart beating a little harder.

"Try to make me leave."

Del watched the lights go out in the downstairs of the house and come on

in the bedroom that faced the yard.

There was no shade at the window. He could see them clearly through the

6 x 44 sniper scope on the Remington 700. No night vision green haze.

Amber light spilled out from the dormer into the ranch yard, falling

just short of J.D.'s pickup. J.D. and the blond woman taking each

other's clothes off. Kissing. Touching.

J.D. and the blond woman. Like before, but different, Del knew. A

different blond woman; the talker, not the dead one. Still, he didn't

like it. Not a bit. Things were getting too confusing. The blondes were

running together in his mind, their features melding until they were

almost interchangeable. Their images multiplied until he felt as if he

had a swarm of fireflies in his head, swirling around, blinking on and

off, distracting him from the business of maintaining his sanity. He

needed to concentrate, but he couldn't. He needed to stay within

himself, but he couldn't hold his mind steady enough. It kept exploding

outward in a dozen directions at once. In his mind's eye he saw that

happening as if his head were a pumpkin exploding upon the impact of a

168-grain .308 hollowpoint load. Boomi Pumpkin pudding. That was his

mind.

He was breathing hard as he lowered the nose of the Remington. His

vision blurred. He pressed his lips together as best he could. Still,

spittle drooled down over the button of puckered flesh on his jaw and

dripped onto his shirt. There was something he ought to do. He knew

there was. The blondes were haunting him day and night.

They were after J.D. J.D. said they were after the ranch.

There had to be something he could do. He'd been nothing but a burden

since the 'Nam. During those glory days he would have known what to do.

During that time his mind had been as sharp as a blade, his instincts

honed to perfection. He'd been a hero, a machine, a human rifle with a

hair trigger and a true shot. Now he couldn't hold his train of thought

long enough to form all the right questions, let alone find the answers.

The tracks ran together in his mind in an indecipherable tangle, like

the rails at the big stockyards in Billings.

This blonde, that blonde, dead blondes. Tigers in the night. The

dog-boys stealing through the trees to do their dirty business. How

could he tell J.D. any of that when he didn't have the slightest clue

what was real and what wasn't?
 
It was all real to Del, but he knew his

nephew didn't see dead girls in the night, or tigers on the mountain.

The shame of that trembled inside him like a fist that had been

tightened and tightened until the knuckles turned white. If only he

could do something to stop it all.

If only he could make the blondes go away forever. If only he could be

strong again, his mind whole for just a little while. He didn't ask for

much from this life. If he could just have this one thing for just a

little while.

He would have asked, but there was no God to hear him or He would have

answered years ago.

The crowd in the Moose lounge was edgy and electric. Talk of the

break-in rippled through the room. Being questioned by the sheriff's

department had put an unexpected spark of excitement into a number of

vacations. Strangers swapped interview stories and traded theories about

the vanishing bandit. He was a local lunatic who had been lying in wait

to attack the woman. He was a local lowlife who saw the well-heeled

patrons of the Mystic Moose as easy targets. He was an infamous jewel

thief who had followed his prey up from Hollywood. He was an infamous

jewel thief by night who was a famous actor by day. He was Robin Hood,

Jesse James, and Hannibal Lecter rolled into one, and it was all the

more exciting that he hadn't been caught.

Lodge management had assured there would be no repeat performance, and

extra security people prowled the halls, only adding to the frontier

atmosphere people had come here for in the first place.

Samantha listened to the stories and speculation as she worked the

tables, a little worried about spending the night alone. She didn't

sleep well by herself on the best of nights. She had grown up in a small

house bursting at the seams with people. Nights had been filled with the

sleep sounds of her brothers and sisters - bedsprings creaking, covers

rustling, her sister Rae talking in her dreams, her father snoring, bare

feet padding to the bathroom in the middle of the night. All those years