A Light For My Love (34 page)

Instead he slipped his hands inside the thin
garment to slide it and the wrapper off her shoulders and let them
drift to the floor.

"Oh, Jake, don't—" Lowering her face, she
tried to cover herself with her arms.

"Hush, now," he soothed. "I want to look at
you." He lifted her hands and held them wide, taking in the
splendor of her.

In the fire's glow, her skin was the color of
rich cream. She made him think of the tales he'd heard about
mermaids trapped on land to become sailors' wives. Heavy black
curls that tumbled to her waist. Full, lush breasts with dusky
coral nipples. A dark triangle at the juncture of her thighs.
Awestruck, he swallowed hard, resisting the impulse to kneel at her
feet in adoration. She was even sweeter than he'd imagined.

"God, China, you're the most beautiful woman
I've ever seen."

China felt dreadfully self-conscious,
standing before him without her clothes. But his praise sounded so
honest, she relaxed a little.

Jake put one of her hands on the knot he'd
tied at his hip, and looked meaningfully into her eyes.

"Come on, honey," he urged again, "don't be
afraid."

Her fingers fell on his warm skin and
lingered, motionless. She hadn't thought she'd have to do anything.
She'd supposed her role was to let Jake do what he would. After
all, she had no experience in this.

But then he dipped his mouth to her breast
again. When his lips tugged on her nipple with light, sucking
pressure, a quiet moan escaped her. She arched against him, nearly
standing on tiptoe. A fire started in her that shot arrows through
her abdomen, melting her from the inside out. If Jake hadn't been
holding her, she might have toppled over backward. Almost
reflexively, she groped for the knot.

Jake straightened and stood motionless while
she untied his towel. Briefly, she held the fabric, then let it
fall between them. She cast a timid glance at his aroused body,
limned by firelight. But before she could give it much thought,
Jake reached for her hand and closed her fingers around himself.
The feel of him was a surprise: hot, smooth, rigid. She tried to
draw back, but with his hand closed over hers, she couldn't. The
action of her fingers pulling over his flesh seemed only to inflame
him.

"Jesus Christ," he groaned. He tipped his
head back and briefly shut his eyes, sucking in a rough, hitching
breath. "Do that again."

"You mean this?"

He nodded, and she continued for a few
moments, her shyness fading. She delighted in his restless
response. It gave her a sense of power, of allure. Finally he
pulled her hand away.

His quest became more urgent. He bore her to
the mattress and laid her on her back as his mouth moved over her.
Laying his body down next to her, he put kisses on her throat and
ears and breasts. He felt so fiery to her touch, she wondered if he
had a fever. Then she realized her own skin was just as warm.

A confusion of painfully intense sensations
coursed through her, as though she were delirious. She saw Jake
hovering above her on his elbow, his pale hair gleaming in the
firelight as he lowered his head to tease her other nipple. She
felt his breath coming fast as it fanned her skin.

When he moved his hand past her rib cage,
down her flat stomach and over her thighs, she was overtaken by a
breathless urgency she'd never known before. A tightness, a
heaviness rode low in her belly, spreading out and down, until it
began a liquid, pulsing ache.

Jake pressed the heel of his hand on that
ache, once, and heard her inhale sharply. He reached for her again,
this time with gentle, searching fingertips that delved her
exquisitely sensitized flesh. When he found the most sensitive
point of all, wet and swollen, she gasped and arched against his
hand.

"Oh, God, China," Jake whispered hoarsely
upon finding her so near to readiness. Full and heavy, his own
desire escalated to a grinding need. He caressed her throbbing,
slippery flesh with rapid strokes.

Instinctively, China put out a searching hand
and found the febrile, hard length of him trapped against her
thigh. When she tried to wrap her fingers around him, his breath
caught and he nudged her hand away.

"Better not, honey. I won't last."

China didn't know what that meant, but she
was certain she would lose her mind from this tender agony he
inflicted upon her. It only grew worse as the seconds passed. She
writhed under his touch, moaning. Somewhere in the corner of her
mind came the thought that her behavior was distinctly unladylike,
but she couldn't help it.

If only he'd stop. If only he'd never stop.
She uttered a desperate, choked request that had no real form.

"Jake, please  . . . "
She pressed her face against his chest. His heart thundered under
her ear.

But he heard her cry for help. He pulled her
beneath him and covered her body with his own. His weight, bearing
down on her, was comforting.

"China, honey, open your legs to me," he said
with a shaky whisper. "I'll try to be careful."

With what, she wondered distractedly. He
coaxed her thighs apart, and the sweet torment she'd felt was
replaced by a blunt, painful pressure as he slowly thrust into her.
She made a wordless noise of protest in her throat.

"I'm sorry," Jake murmured with regret. Then
he smothered her cry with a kiss, and pushed through with one firm
stroke. He sank into the warm tightness of her with a deep,
groaning sigh. Jolted from her passion, China froze, surprised and
disappointed by the pain, every muscle rigid. Grabbing handfuls of
the bedding, she squirmed against the mattress, attempting to
separate herself from the hurt.

"Try to relax and hold still," he urged,
kissing the tears at the corners of her eyes. "It'll be better in a
minute."

How could it be? she wondered,
disillusioned.

But then Jake began moving inside her,
slowly. A careful thrust forward. A gentle retreat. Again. And
again. Like the ebb and flow of the ocean. As China's body adjusted
to accommodate him, the pain dwindled and heat flared once more,
with double the intensity. She arched against him, meeting his
thrusts in a rhythm that was inborn, set by ancient instincts.

And for this instant in time, they left the
lonely isolation of being two individuals to become one,
together.

Releasing the sheets wadded in her fists, she
looped her arms around his sweat-damp back. She lifted her hips to
him as a kind of offering, so that he could somehow satisfy this
ferocious, aching need that threatened to consume her.

In response, his strokes came faster and
harder. The throbbing between her legs escalated to an extreme that
was almost painful.

"Oh, God," she moaned. "Jake . . . Jake—"

"Let it come, honey," he whispered raggedly.
"It's what you need . . . what we both need."

He wrapped one arm under her waist and
plunged deeper into her until suddenly, China felt as though the
mattress had dropped out from beneath her. Only Jake held her at
this breathless, silent, quivering brink.

Then she tumbled into an abyss where wave
after wave of hot spasms wracked her body, the muscles clamping
down in swift contractions of excruciating pleasure. She heard her
own voice but didn't know if she formed words.

Jake reared high over her on arms that
trembled, his head up, his breathing labored. His thrusts were
short and hard, striving for relief. China looked up at him, at the
sweat gleaming on the column of his throat, at the pained
expression on his face.

From deep in his chest a sound rose, half
groan, half sob, as if a goal of comfort and solace, long sought,
was finally found. His body convulsed in rapid pulsations and she
felt the scalding heat of him pour into her.

Consumed, he let his head drop between his
shoulders, then he lowered himself to lie on top of her,
sweat-soaked and panting into the pillow. She thought she heard him
say her name, but she wasn't certain. When his breathing quieted,
he slowly rolled to his back and took her with him, settling her
against his side.

Her limbs were comfortably languorous, and
lifting her hand to his chest was an effort.

He looked down at her with heavy-lidded eyes.
"Are you okay?" he asked, kissing her forehead.

"Yes," she whispered, her heart aching with
love for him. "What about you?"

His lids closed and his mouth turned up in a
smile of sated exhaustion. He reached for her hand and pressed it
to his lips. "I'm fine. As a matter of fact, can't remember the
last time I was so fine."

China expected the regret to settle in, a
cold, aching knot in her stomach, but she supposed that might not
be until tomorrow. For now, she was content to lie here with
Jake.

He would be leaving soon, on a voyage that
would take months and months. After
that . . . She glanced at his tattoo in the
dying firelight.

This talisman had brought him home once.
Maybe it would work again.

*~*~*

A ruddy glow was all that remained of the
fire, and cold crept into the room with stealthy progress. Outside,
wind and rain beat against the windows with a muffled sound. China
slept, her head pillowed on Jake's shoulder, one soft breast
flattened against his ribs. The quilts were pulled up around her so
that only her face was visible in the near-darkness. He gently
began to ease his arm out from beneath her so he could tend the
fire, but in her sleep, China made a little noise of complaint.

"Shhh," he comforted. "Go back to sleep,
honey."

She turned her face toward his chest. He lay
back and contented himself with tucking them in more snugly,
creating a pocket of warmth in the big bed.

The scent of her, wood and spice, and his own
satisfied desire, came to him. She was his now, whether she knew it
or not, whether he wanted it or not, no matter what separate paths
their lives would take tomorrow. They'd left a mark on each other's
souls as indelible as the tattoo on his arm, and he would regret
it.

It had been one thing to hanker for her—what
had that been? A desire to conquer her? Not a very noble ambition,
though he admitted to himself that it was possible. Lust?
Definitely.

But there was one more aspect, an emotion
that he'd doggedly ignored. It had sat within him, trying to make
its small voice heard, for years. Then tonight, at the instant he'd
joined his body to hers, it had come storming to the fore with a
silent scream.

When Jake had taken China, he'd lost
himself.

He lifted his hand to cradle the back of her
head and pressed his cheek to her forehead. With his other hand, he
gently rubbed her back, feeling with his fingertips each vertebra
under her soft skin. In response, she stirred briefly and burrowed
against him, tangling her legs with his, seeking warmth and
closeness.

When the
Katherine
sailed, he would be
gone for a long time, but maybe, just maybe, he'd have a reason to
come home to Astoria. Yesterday he wouldn't have thought so. It
would be easier if she cared for him. But, still, now, a glimmer of
hope stirred in his heart.

Gathering her to the shelter of his arms, he
kissed her temple and waited until her breathing resumed the slow,
even rhythm of sleep. Then he sighed and, certain that she would
not hear, whispered into the dark of the night.

"I wish you loved me, too."

*~*~*

What
was
that sound? China nestled
against Jake's warm, bare body, trying to shut out the faraway
voice dragging her back to wakefulness. Not yet, she prayed. She
didn't want the night to end yet.

He was asleep on his side and she wrapped her
arm around his waist, tucking her head between her pillow and his
back. Groggily, he reached behind and patted her hip.

God, there it was again. Someone was pounding
on the front door, too.

"Captain!"

Beside her, an electrified jolt ran through
Jake's body, and he sat up in the darkness as though he had springs
in his back. "Huh? When?"

"Captain Chastaine!" Coming from outside, it
was a young man's voice. Sleepy though she was, China detected an
urgency that made her uneasy.

Jake bounded out of bed and went to the
window that overlooked the front yard. Lifting the sash, he stuck
his head out. From the color of the sky that framed his naked
silhouette, China saw that it was just before dawn.

"I'm Captain Chastaine. What do you want?" he
called down in a lowered voice.

"Captain, Mr. Tewey said you better come
quick! Your ship is on fire!"

China heard the sound of footsteps running
away, a muffled splashing on the wet street.

"What a minute!" he yelled after the
messenger. But apparently, he was gone. "Holy Christ," Jake said
hollowly. He turned and groped through the dark to the night table,
almost knocking it over when he bumped into it. He fumbled around
on its surface and suddenly a match flared. His face was a ghastly
gray-white, etched with what she recognized as hideous fear. He lit
the bedside lamp with a hand that shook ever so slightly.

Stunned and momentarily paralyzed, China
could only clutch the sheet to her bosom and stare at him. "Jake—my
God—your ship—"

But he didn't even favor her with a glance.
He stalked to the dresser and yanked open drawers, putting on the
first clothes his hands fell on. Every

movement was tense and jerky. His breathing
had a harsh, rasping sound.

"I'm coming with you," China said, scooting
to the edge of the mattress.

He looked up from the task of lacing his
boots, and arrested her with a flinty, merciless glare. She
recoiled at the emotion she saw in his eyes. It was so intense, she
couldn't give it just a single name.

"No, you're not," he ordered hoarsely. "I
don't have time to worry about looking after you, too."