Susan Johnson (7 page)

Trey flipped the covers back after Blue quietly shut the door and pulled Empress into his arms. “Blue’s like a brother to me. Meet him next time. You’ll like him.”

Twisting her head to look up at him, Empress said, “It’s embarrassing.”

“No one cares about ‘embarrassing’ here. And Blue and Fox are almost always with me, so …”

“I might as well meet them.”

“Might as well,” he agreed.

“Why are they always with you?” She’d heard the rumors about the Indian troubles with Hazard and the big cattle interests, but only barely. Too isolated up in the mountains and too immersed in her own struggle for survival, Empress hadn’t the time or energy to be concerned with wealthy men’s problems.

“Bodyguards.”

She looked at him with a tilt of her brows. So it was true. “Who wants to kill you?”

“It’s nothing personal,” he replied with a smile. “It’s just that I represent my father’s interests, and a lot of people don’t like Indians like my father who haven’t been robbed of their land”—his smiled widened—“and think they’re as good as a white man. We’re supposed to be content to stay on the reservation and live on the government’s dole. That’s provided any of it gets through the gauntlet of thieves operating the Indian Affairs Department. My father chose not to. He also controls a large tract of land many people would like to get their hands on.” He shrugged. “So I have bodyguards when some of the threats become overt. It’s a nuisance sometimes, but—”

“Have you ever really needed them except as a deterrent?” The notion somehow seemed out of place in the wilds, or here in this gilded brothel, and for a moment her eyes were wide with inquiry.

Gazing at her, Trey wondered if she’d only come to Montana recently and didn’t understand all the convoluted political intrigue or the style of justice prevalent on the frontier. “Occasionally,” he said mildly, but his eyes for a brief second lost their charming warmth, and precise memory recalled too many lessons learned concerning human treachery and greed. It was a conversation he didn’t care to continue. “By the way,” he said abruptly, circumventing details about the people after his half-breed blood, “we’ll move to my apartment tomorrow. It’s less public. And you’ll need clothes.”

“I have clothes.”

“We’ll have them burned,” he said pleasantly.

However pleasant his tone, it was a brutal reminder of her position. “You’re the master, I suppose,” she replied, ruffled and touchy. “At least for the next three weeks.” And rolling away, she sat up and glared at him.

He smiled lazily, finding her as beautiful out of temper as in, and, idly reflecting on the perfect curve of her narrow waist, declared, “In that case, I’ll have to take advantage of my authority. I can’t recall ever being a master before. Will I need my quirt?”

“I
wouldn’t
recommend it,” Empress replied in a softly honeyed tone, her eyes basilisk green.

“Good, I can have my way without it. Thank you, darling, for being so understanding,” Trey teased lightly, sliding down a fraction on the pillows piled behind his head. Stretching, he
arched his back, then settled back into the down mattress. “Some velvet gowns and a cashmere wrap, I think,” he began, ticking off the items on his bronzed, lean fingers. “It’s so cold this time of year,” he added, with an indulgent smile. “A few silk nighties … Is silk all right, or would you prefer flannel?” he asked the woman who continued to look black daggers at him. “And a fur cape for driving. Do you like sleigh rides?” Silver eyes traveled slowly downward, taking in the full richness of Empress’s opulent form, then unhurriedly returned to hold her glance with his. His thoughts were suddenly absorbed by an erotic image of Empress lying on furs in his red-lacquer sleigh.

“You needn’t spend any more money on me,” Empress retorted heatedly, the litany of elegant clothes sounding in her ears like chaffing charity.

“I’d like to see you dressed like a woman. Humor me, sweet.”

She didn’t answer for a long moment, feminine vanity warring with a powerful self-determination. Practicality interceded at the last: She was in no position to fight Trey Braddock-Black. “It’s your money,” she replied curtly.

“True,” he said, entertained. “Do you have a preference in furs? Something dark, perhaps, with your coloring. You’d look luscious spread out on dark sable or black mink.…”

“I thought the fur was for sleigh rides,” she reminded him pointedly.

“We’ll get one for
after
sleigh rides too,” he said with a very private kind of smile. “Tell me your favorite foods,” he went on casually. “I’ll have the apartment stocked. You needn’t be this thin.”

She stared at him for a moment, her gaze clear, unplacid green. His own, instantly accommodating, shone a twinkling silver. “I adore slender women,” he said. “Now flowers,” he continued deftly. “What kind of flowers do you like?”

“Flowers?”
Empress exclaimed in shocked surprise, the sound of the blizzard howling outside making talk of flowers outrageous. “You can’t mean it.”

Trey had learned long ago there was very little that couldn’t be bought if you put your mind to it. “Depends what you like. What do you like?” His tone was calm.

“You could never get them now,” she blurted out. As if one could get forsythia in the middle of winter in Montana!

But when, at his insistence, she’d told him, he said he’d try.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this, she thought, bewildered. She’d seen her indenture as a sacrifice to be endured, clenchteethed and detached, a compliance without enthusiasm. It wasn’t supposed to be lingering warmth from this man’s touch, and comfort like she hadn’t considered for five long years. It was supposed to be conflict in her heart and mind and soul. Instead, it was enchantment luring her into silvery eyes and the knowledge that blissful pleasure was only an arm’s length away and waiting for her. “Come here,” he said, his voice low, as gentle as flute music in the twilight. He held out his hand. And she went to him because she couldn’t help herself.

A moment later, lying within the circle of his arms, she tipped her chin upward on his chest and quietly breathed, “Such extravagance seems … somehow sinful.” She didn’t mean it in a moralistic way but only in relation to the dire poverty of her existence the last few years.

“Speaking of sin,” Trey murmured, sliding his hands down the curve of her spine, “you’re tempting as sin yourself, lying here all indolent and warm and new. Would you mind …” He smiled faintly into her upturned eyes. “I mean, if you’ve rested enough … I have this unaccountable urge—” Stopping, he raised one dark brow, his pale eyes assessing. “Well, not precisely unaccountable. You’re delicious … and I’m mad for you.” He couldn’t explain that “unaccountable” was only in terms of all his previous urges and temptations apropos women and love. Love for him had always been sportive and sumptuous but never,
never
urgent. That was why this current wanting struck him as unaccountable. He wanted her beyond the usual playfulness or dalliance or casual taking. He wanted her without discretion, like a young boy wants his first taste of love, or like an insistent child wants to touch a rainbow’s tail. He wanted her beyond reason and logic. He wanted her … now.

She meant to say no at least the first time, to show that he couldn’t so easily have his way with everything in the world, that he couldn’t be a spoiled child of fortune
always
, that she
had some control in this bizarre relationship which he saw as an enchanting whim.

But he whispered heated love words that started the fires kindling in her. Told her in intoxicating detail what he was going to do to her and how she’d feel and where she should look if she wanted to see how much he wanted her. And when she looked, he told her how long he was going to make love to her. He caressed, stroked, fondled, petted, and made her forget for a transient time that the real world wasn’t all silken touches, luxury, and ease.

Or was it? she wondered dazedly short moments later, charmed and inveigled past sense or reason.

He teased her, calling her
“ba
icbí
wicgye ditsirá
tsi,”
which he’d translated as “my fierce kitten,” when she’d cried for him frantically. He whispered he’d take care of her … and all her needs. “Stay with me,” he murmured heatedly, and he’d not meant the three weeks. But he wasn’t completely sober, she knew, because the taste of brandy was heady when he kissed her. He may be different in the morning. But right now, with his mouth trailing down her throat, she didn’t want to think about morning or any of the hundreds of problems in her life. She didn’t want to think at all.

Trey’s mouth slid down her smooth stomach and slowly drifted between her legs. Resting his cheek against her warm thigh, he looked up at her.
“Ba
icbí
wicgye ditsirá
tsi,”
he whispered. “Show me where you want me to touch you,” And taking her hand, he languidly kissed each fingertip while the weight of his head pressed against her thigh. Then sucking gently on her last finger, he released her hand from his mouth and guided it the few inches toward the heat pulsing between her legs. “Here, fierce kitten?” he asked softly, sliding her small hand across her rosy, distended flesh, swollen and throbbing from his use of her and her need for him. “Tell me …”