The Mavericks (18 page)

She wanted to touch him, to give him even a fraction of the pleasure he was giving her, but her muscles had lost their strength. She felt barely able to move her hand, much less lift her whole arm. The feel of Hawk's lips and hands on her breasts made her feel exquisitely helpless. She hadn't the force of will to think about anything except the stockpiling of sensations that was rocking her body from end to end. She wasn't even aware that Hawk had undone the belt that held her skirt in place until he slipped the garment under her hips and off her body. It was a simple matter to slip off the moccasins she wore in camp, and then she was naked except for her chemise.

“Take off your shirt.” She couldn't summon the energy to do it herself, but she wanted to feel his naked skin against her own. She wanted to explore every contour, to slide her fingers over every rib, to glory in the softness that covered such great strength. She wanted to find out if she could give him even a small portion of the pleasure he was giving her. Being with Hawk had given her hope that lovemaking could be something more than a quick physical gratification, that he could enjoy nearness and touching as much as she could. She wanted to know if it was possible to
share
the experience rather than be the object of it.

She felt the loss of his heat when he sat up to remove his shirt.

Hawk couldn't have looked more beautiful in the full glare of day than he did at this moment in moonlight. His skin glowed like rich honey. She was sure that one taste would render her a helpless addict. She
couldn't resist resting her hand on his back, marveling at the play of muscles across his shoulders as he worked to remove his boots. He was like a large cat, sleek, powerful, and hot to the touch. Drawn irresistibly to his warmth, she slipped her arms around his waist and leaned against his back. He was so hot it was like snuggling up to a stove. Tossing aside his second boot, Hawk turned to her, but she said, “Your pants, too.” He must not stop now. She had to have all of him.

“I don't wear anything under them.”

She wasn't sure she was ready to have him next to her completely naked. Up to this moment, they'd shared this experience. She was afraid that nakedness would make his physical need impossible to postpone, but she wanted to be rid of the barrier his buckskins put between them. “That's okay.”

“I'll trade you, pants for chemise.”

All of a sudden things were moving too fast. She thought he'd understood that for her the most important part of making love came before the ultimate consummation—their closeness, the touches, the shared warmth, the feeling that
she
mattered to him, not just her body.

“We don't have to do anything that makes you uncomfortable.” With surprising gentleness, Hawk took her face in his hands and kissed her. “We can just lie next to each other if that's what you want.”

The relief and happiness that flooded through Suzette was followed almost immediately by a churning physical need to have more of Hawk than just his kisses and embraces.

“I want that very much, but I want more. Much more.”

Hawk's kisses were so sweet, so loving, she nearly dissolved right there in his arms. She wasn't aware that he had deftly slipped the chemise over her shoulders and down to her waist until the cool air on the heated skin of her abdomen caused her to shiver. So slowly that she felt she was sinking into a cloud, Hawk leaned her back until she was resting on the bedroll. He trailed kisses across her stomach, causing her body to shake with anticipation. She had never known that every part of her could be so sensitive. Maybe it was Hawk's touch that had awakened a sensitivity she didn't know she possessed. Maybe it was his making love to her whole body, to her whole being, that had penetrated an inner core she'd always kept protected until now. Whatever it was, his magical touch was communicating with her body in a language all its own. He didn't have to tell her to raise her body. His hands moving along the outside of her hips was all the encouragement her muscles needed to rise until she was free of the chemise. She shivered in anticipation.

“You're so beautiful,” Hawk whispered into the hollow of her shoulder.

She didn't realize until the air in her lungs escaped her body in a shuddering breath that she had been so tense, that she had been afraid that in some way she'd fall short of his expectations. Knowing she hadn't gave her courage to say, “I want to see you.” The words tried to stick in her throat, but she forced them out.

Using only one hand so he wouldn't have to break contact with her, Hawk slipped out of his pants and
tossed them aside. Without giving Suzette a chance to look at him as he had looked at her, he put his arms around her and pulled her against him. The feel of his arousal against her thigh ignited a fire that threatened to consume her in a conflagration of desire and need. She tried to tell him that she wanted to explore his body as he'd explored hers, but once again her desire was swept away by her own need to be consumed by him. She wanted him to touch her everywhere. She
needed
him to want her as much as she wanted him.

Her arms encircled Hawk's neck to pull him down so she could kiss him, hold him close, glory in the feel of his body next to hers, in the knowledge that his heat flowed into her as hers flowed into him. She couldn't explain why this closeness was so important to her. She wanted to bind him to her, absorb him. She kept being distracted by his hand as it trailed down her side, swept across her belly, and moved down the outside of her hip and thigh. His touch was so feathery it raised goose bumps on her skin. She didn't understand how she could feel so hot and cold at the same time. When Hawk's lips found her breast once again, the heat that surged through her body banished all traces of cold. The beginnings of a wildfire lurked just under her skin.

Hawk teased her breasts with his tongue and teeth. Her nipples were sensitive and swollen from his earlier attention, but her body arched against him. She wanted to press hard until their bodies merged, until she felt like she was part of him. His hand cupped her behind and pulled her hard against his arousal. A soft moan escaped him. He took her earlobe between his teeth and bit down until she couldn't stand it any
longer. In desperation to experience him before she lost control completely, Suzette moved her hand down his back, across his thigh, and between them until she touched him.

“Don't!”

His body flinched, and she snatched her hand back. His protest had been so sharp she feared she'd hurt him, but the need to touch him was nearly uncontrollable. “I want to hold you.”

Speaking through clenched teeth, he said, “Take it easy, or I'll explode.”

Loath to move quickly, Suzette ran her hand over the small of Hawk's back before moving down to encounter the swell of his buttocks. Excitement bloomed within her as she slowly moved her hand over his posterior. Hawk's muscles clenched at her touch, turning the soft flesh into mounds of hard sinew. The sensation nearly left her breathless. She moved her hand farther down to explore the powerful thighs that gripped his horse's sides for hours every day. Once again the feeling of great power flowed from him.

Suzette's breath paused when she moved her hand over Hawk's hip and found her way between their bodies. As she gradually folded her fingers around him, she felt that she was holding a column of fire. He was incredibly hard, but his skin was soft and warm. She wanted to caress him, fondle him, even kiss him there, but his body was so rigid, his breathing so labored, she was afraid it would drive him over the edge. It seemed unfair that she shouldn't have as much freedom to explore his body as he had to explore hers.

His hands roaming over her back and buttocks only made her uncomfortably warm. He slid his hands between
her legs, but she didn't explode. He touched her at her entrance, and she tensed only slightly. But when he found and massaged a small, incredibly sensitive nub, she felt she would explode.

“What did you do?” she gasped once she'd recovered her breath. She must have cried out, because the birds were fluttering in the trees again.

“What you did to me.”

That was impossible. It couldn't be the same, or he wouldn't have been able to endure it in silence. But she was completely uninterested in weighing the intensity of their separate experiences. Hawk had now entered her with his fingers, and he was driving her crazy, making it impossible for her to care about anything except what he was doing to her. The molten heat that had centered in her belly was now spreading to the rest of her body at an alarming rate. Before long she would be so consumed by it, she wouldn't be able to think of anything else.

But she didn't
want
to think of anything else. Nothing else was important. She wanted to pull away from him, yet she pushed herself against him, trying to drive him deeper inside. As the spirals of pleasure wound tighter and tighter around her body, she grew more frantic until her breath was coming in gasps. “What are you doing?” She had thought she knew what being with a man was like, but she'd never experienced anything like this.

“Giving you pleasure.”

His hand plunged deeper inside her while his mouth tortured her breasts until she was sure she would lose control. She tried to speak, but couldn't. She tried to move her body, but her muscles wouldn't respond. She tried to
think, but gradually abandoned the effort. It was all she could do to exist, to endure Hawk's exquisite torture. But as he continued to make love to her body, that became harder and harder. She wanted to cry out, but his kisses swallowed her protests. She attempted to pull away, but his arms held her in a firm embrace. Finally, when she was certain she couldn't stand it any longer, something inside her seemed to burst and flow from her like liquid heat.

Gasping, Suzette surrendered to waves of pleasure such as she'd never experienced before. She wanted to ask Hawk what he'd done to her. She wondered if it was possible to do it again, but even if she'd been capable of speech at that moment, she would have been afraid to ask. The experience had been so overwhelming, so shattering, she didn't know if she could survive it again. Yet even as that thought crossed her mind, it was shoved aside by the sure knowledge that she wanted it to happen again, that she
needed
it to happen again.

Her breathing hadn't yet become regular when, without warning, Hawk rose above her and slowly entered her until she was certain she could stretch no more. In seconds the tension in her body was back, the coils of desire wrapping around her with suffocating strength. She tried to speak, to gesture, to communicate, but she was incapable of doing anything but reacting to the excitement thrumming through her body. It seemed to be the same with Hawk. As he moved inside her, he fell farther and farther under the sway of his own need. The expression on his face gradually changed from one of concentration to one approaching a kind of mindless ecstasy. His eyes gradually
closed and his mouth fell open. His breath became as ragged as her own. Suzette wanted to give him the same pleasure he was giving her, but everything became so blurred she was conscious only of them moving together toward ecstasy. Her gaze became unfocused and she gave herself up completely to the pleasure that welled up from her core and spread to every part of her body.

Suddenly Hawk's body became rigid, his moans turned to grunts, and she felt him explode within her. That set off an answering explosion inside her, and she slowly slid down the other side of consciousness.

Suzette was incapable of response when Hawk pulled away and lay down next to her. She didn't know how long she lay without moving. Hawk's breath gradually slowed and his body became motionless, and still she couldn't move. Even when he fell asleep, she continued to lie there gradually absorbing what had happened to her. It wasn't what she had expected. It wasn't exactly the same as being created all over again, yet she couldn't help believing that practically everything in her world had changed. Or maybe just the way she looked at things had changed.

She might not know what it was for days, maybe even weeks, but something was different. She wasn't the same person she'd been when she'd left the wagon to spend the night with Hawk. She didn't know how this was going to affect her future, but the fact that it
would
affect it scared her. She'd figured everything out long ago. She knew what she had to do and how to do it. Nothing could change what she owed her sister.

Yet tonight had added something new to the
equation—something that threw everything out of balance. She had no doubt that the something was Hawk.

She turned and burrowed next to him. He reached out in his sleep and pulled her closer. Even as she melted into his embrace, she knew she'd made a mistake in not sleeping in the wagon. She also knew the cost of that mistake was going to be high.

Hawk lay on his back and stared at the stars in the cloudless sky. Suzette's head rested on his shoulder. The cold had awakened him and he'd gotten up to dress and find a blanket to throw over her. But even as the warmth returned to his body, he was unable to fall asleep. He didn't want to miss the feeling of her sleeping in his arms. It felt natural to have her there, to feel her warmth, the weight of her body against him, to hear her breathing, to sense her body's expansion and contraction against him with each breath. Even the smell of her hair seemed familiar and comforting.

He should feel crowded, uncomfortable, anxious to get away and return to the comfort of his solitude, his companionship with Zeke. That's the way it had worked for two decades, and that's the way it ought to be working now.

He'd been with several women. Some he'd liked enough to continue the relationship for more than a week, even more than a month. Some he'd thought he could marry. Some had wanted to marry him, but it had never worked out. Either they didn't like Zeke or they wanted Hawk to settle down and take a job in an office. He'd finally come to the realization that
he
was the reason those relationships didn't work out. After that, he'd stayed away from women.