Runaway (38 page)

Jarrett had been the Indian. But Jarrett had no Indian blood in him, or did he?

These two were almost of a height. From the back they might well have been the same person.

The half-breed had brought something with him, a basket, which he offered to Jarrett. “Thank you,” Jarrett told him in English.

“You’re welcome,” the half-breed said. Clearly.

Tara gasped involuntarily. She stood up, hugging her blanket close, staring at the man, her eyes narrowing, her temper rising all over again. “You speak English!” she accused him.

He arched a brow at Jarrett. “You haven’t told her yet?” He smiled suddenly, having noticed something about Tara. “You haven’t
untied
her yet?”

Tara felt her flesh go crimson.

“I haven’t had that much time alone with her yet,” Jarrett explained.

“Ah …” murmured the half-breed, his lip still curling. When he smiled so, he was a very striking man, Tara thought.

Like Jarrett.

“Is Osceola still here?” Jarrett asked.

The half-breed shook his head.

“Good!” Jarrett murmured softly. His eyes fell upon Tara. “If she carries on till dawn, it won’t matter a whit to me now!”

Tara gasped.

The half-breed inclined his head to her. “I think I should leave you two. It was a pleasure meeting you, Tara McKenzie,” he said, and while she still stared after him, angry and baffled, he exited the cabin.

“What in God’s name is going on here?” she demanded furiously of Jarrett.

He didn’t answer her. Instead he walked toward her again, shedding the towel as he came. Barefoot, silent, a copper wraith with the grace of a panther, he stalked her with determination.

He came before her, set his hands upon her shoulders, and threw the blanket to the floor.

“Jarrett—”

“It’s been a long time. Forever. An eternity. All right, so it hasn’t been so long, but it feels like
bloody forever!
” His hands were on her shoulders again, forcing her down.

“Jarrett!” she cried out, trying to thrust her bound wrists before her. But he caught her wrists and forced her to the floor, stretching her arms over her head, running his fingertips down their smooth whiteness as he lay atop her. She inhaled sharply, furious, yet feeling the hunger grow as if it were fueled by the very emotion that made her long for the power to scalp him!

“I mean it!” she cried put, her lips trembling. “I’ll never forgive you for this. Given half a chance I’ll have half of your hair and your scalp and—”

He didn’t seem to hear her. “Too damned bloody long!” he whispered, leaning over her.

“Jarrett!”—She whispered his name again, trying to twist her head aside. But his lips captured hers. Hot and hungry, giving no quarter. His mouth closed over hers, his tongue forcing her lips and teeth apart. And all the while the lapping fires inside her seemed to grow, heating, igniting, simmering, playing havoc within her flesh and blood. His touch was upon her again, his palm covering her breast, massaging it, sliding down between her legs.

Parting them with a firm thrust.

She gasped as he stretched hard over her for a moment. Then he rose above her on his knees. There was a knife in his hands. She nearly shrieked, but she caught hold of her bottom lip with her teeth and held silent, her heart pounding mercilessly, as he leaned over and slit the leather straps that bound her wrists.

Then he was upon her.

And it had been long, too long, forever. Because she, too, quickly forgot that she had intended to fight him, that she was exhausted, that she had been held prisoner here all day and night, that she had scraped skins, ground roots.

She forgot everything with the wild, searing sensation that came as he lifted her thighs, parted them, thrust himself full within her. Black eyes captured hers. Sleek sweat cast a new sheen over his coppery length as he moved within her, watching her. Her hands fell upon his shoulders. She wanted to push him away. She hadn’t the strength, or the desire. She couldn’t even close her eyes, twist her face from his. She just held him tight to her, feeling the screwing of the fiery coil within her, the sweet agony of wanting him, of emotions spiraling ever upward with his erotic tempest. It was almost frightening
to realize how much she wanted this. Wanted him. Frightening to realize how glad she was of him, of feeling the shudder of his sleek nude body, the force of it, the heat of it. Wild thunder seemed to beat within her ears; it was the pounding echo of her heart. Then she seemed to burst into a field of splendor, of searing light, and she had barely cried out with the violent ecstasy of it when his climax came shuddering through her, creating a new wave of sweet ripples within her as she drifted back to a plane of sanity. She felt the soft furs against her damp back, the slick, hard heat of his flesh against her own. His weight, the still rampant pounding of his heart. His fingers entwined tightly within her hair for a moment, eased from it, and he slid to her side.

She was silent for a minute, catching her own breath, staring up at the shadowed roof. He reached for her again, trying to draw her into his arms, but she protested his hold on her.

“I’m still going to strangle you, given half a chance,” she told him stiffly.

“Me?” he demanded, and, rolling onto an elbow, stared down at her. His striking features were tense; a lock of ebony hair fell over one eye. “I wasn’t the one who was where I shouldn’t have been—running away.”

She made an impatient sound, trying to push away from him, but he was suddenly braced over her again, and maybe it was just as well. They were going to have it out. She stared up at him.

“No, you were the one in the Seminole camp seeing that more and more ridiculous chores were set upon your already terrified wife!”

“They told you they wouldn’t hurt you,” he said, and perhaps an evasive shadow did cloud his dark stare.

“There are dozens of whites dead across the territory, but I should have felt reassured!”

“You should have felt damned lucky!” he said with a touch of irritation. “Not many whites would have received no more than a tongue lashing from Osceola at this moment.”

“Osceola!” she repeated, shuddering. “My God. He was the man with the feathered bonnet and the red leggings!”

“Yes.”

She felt a trembling deep inside her. Osceola, possibly the strongest war chief among these heathens now! And he had come upon her in the woods! He might have—

“Oh!” she gasped, suddenly slamming her fists against his chest with a rage born of renewed terror. “You left me in this savage wilderness to be taken by Osceola, a savage who absolutely hates all whites—”

“He doesn’t hate all whites.”

“That’s right—he just thinks the world of you!”

“He’s an exceptionally smart fellow who has seen what has happened to his people, yet he does not hate all whites. He is at war with them, yes.”

“I do hope you’re around to explain the difference the next time he is murdering and scalping your friends and neighbors! Damn you! You left me to—”

“I left you at home, where you had been warned to stay!” he roared in return, catching the fists that had so recently pummeled him. “By the time I found your trail, you had already been taken here.”

“And you could have made your presence known hours and hours ago!” she cried.

He didn’t deny it.

“You did tell them to make me do all those things!”

His eyes narrowed, hardened. “You were warned not to leave the property. If you hadn’t been running away—”

“I wasn’t running away!” she protested angrily.

“Then what were you doing?” he demanded.

She opened her mouth, then wondered if it wouldn’t be worse to say that she had been trying to reach Robert Treat. Robert was his friend, his best friend, she knew, but she was aware that she had tried upon occasion to make Jarrett jealous where Robert was concerned. Perhaps to soothe her own soul.

“I wasn’t running away,” she repeated.

He leaned closer to her. “Where were you going?”

“Oh, no!” she protested indignantly. “I’m not answering another question from you. ‘White Tiger,’ indeed! What is going on here? The blue-eyed one—what’s his name?”

“Running Bear,” Jarrett said after a moment.

“Running Bear—who is capable of speaking such perfect English!” Tara said bitterly.

“Completely perfect,” Jarrett agreed.

She leveled her stare on him, wishing he weren’t still straddling her, his hold looser but his fingers still wound around her wrists. The intimacy wasn’t painful, but it was distracting. She was very much aware of his hard body, of his sex, at rest, yet still so insinuating against her belly. It was difficult to breathe. She felt as if she were gasping in huge breaths of air, and with each it seemed that her breasts rose and fell a bit more quickly.

“And,” she commented, “it seems that your Seminole is just as perfect. Is that what you were speaking?”

“It’s a Muskogee language.”

“Muskogee?”

He shrugged. “I speak Hitichi almost as well. It isn’t a great feat, really, I grew up hearing both of them frequently.”

“Growing—up?” she demanded.

He didn’t reply.

“I want to know now,” she said stubbornly. “What was he talking about? What haven’t you told me?”

He released her, rolling to his side once again, staring up at the ceiling. He lifted his hands, then let them fall back to his chest.

“James McKenzie.”

“What?”

“Running Bear. He is also known as James McKenzie.”

She inhaled a ragged gasp. “But—”

“He’s my brother, Tara.” He rolled up on an elbow, with the speed and grace of a snake this time, staring at her again. “William is your brother, Tara. James is mine.”

She gasped, bolting up. Dear God, yes! But it made sense! She had thought that Jarrett
was
the Indian, from the back, with his head of ebony hair, and the brothers were so close in height and build.

So he had a Seminole for a brother! And he had grown up among the Indians! No wonder he was so damned certain that he’d be safe among them.

And he hadn’t told her!

“You bastard!” she breathed. “Oh!” Once again she flung herself at him, and this time with such force that he fell to his back and she straddled him, fists clenched, flailing at his shoulders and chest.

“Tara!”

But she didn’t stop.

“Tara!”

Once again she found herself breathless, heaving, and locked beneath him. Her wrists were imprisoned in his grasp. His thighs locked around her hips.

“Oh, I swear I will—shoot you!” she threatened.

“Tara—”

“In both knees! And I’ll scalp you and—”

“You’ll hush up before your voice carries any farther!” he warned her.

“I’ll tell you exactly what I think of you, just as loudly as I—”

“You’ll close your mouth, my love.”

“I—”

“I’ll close it for you.”

“How dare you—”

But he did dare, easily, his lips sealing her own, his tongue thrusting to fill her mouth, the force of his kiss robbing her of breath. When his lips parted from hers at last, she couldn’t quite grasp why she had been shouting. She inhaled raggedly and told him, “This is no way to carry on a conversation.”

A smile curled the left side of his mouth just slightly, and a speck of fire seemed to glimmer in his eyes. “We weren’t conversing. We were arguing.”

“And I tell you—”

“And I warn you, don’t try to make a fool of me here!”

“And what have you done to me?”

“I’ve tried to show you the dangers that await wandering wives.”

“You son of—”

“I don’t want to have to teach you more about disobedient ones!”

“Of all the—” she began, but once again she found herself silenced, his lips stealing breath and words this time. Nor when his mouth rose from hers did he intend to allow for further conversation. His hand covered her breast, his mouth clamped down upon it, tongue laving and teasing the tip until she ceased struggling and squirming. Her fingers threaded into his hair, gripping, yet he seemed heedless of their pull, and his hands and lips covered more and more of her with a hungry speed that left her head spinning, her body burning. His kiss
burned into the hollow of her abdomen, his hands slid beneath her, cupping her buttocks. She strained against him, crying out even as he nuzzled lower against her belly, against the soft blond triangle between her limbs. Liquid, searing heat seemed to burst within her, shattering in its sensation. She fought both to free herself and to feel more of him, and just when she thought that the world would explode around her, he was with her again, atop her, within her, holding her. Again his rhythm seized her. She eased for just seconds, then seemed to fly ever higher. She trembled when the explosion wracked her this time, amazed at the force of it, of him, the way that it felt to drift downward, held so securely in his arms. She wanted to fight, wanted to protest anew the charade he had played upon her, yet she hadn’t the strength, or the real desire to battle further this night.

In a corner of her mind she still wanted to hate him.

In her heart she was only glad of him, and if he was with her, the rest of his secrets did not seem to matter so much.

His arms were around her, and she put her fingers upon his bronze ones where they lay against her belly.

“I’m going to strangle your brother too,” she told him softly.

“I’m sure he’ll take it like a man.”

“Is that bathtub regular Seminole issue?” she inquired lightly.

“No,” he admitted after a moment, and though her back was to him, she thought that he was smiling. “The bathtub is mine.”

“And this cabin?”

“Mine as well,” he said softly.

“And everyone else knows this?” she said.

“Not too many people have been out here, but most of my friends and acquaintances know that I have a
brother out here and that I grew up with a band of Creeks-turned-Seminole.”

“You should really be strung up by your toes and beaten mercilessly,” she said.

“It could still happen. Anything is possible in this wilderness.”

She shivered fiercely.

His arms tightened around her. “I didn’t mean that we were in any danger here.”