Katherine O’Neal (39 page)

“How can you claim to distrust truth and
still honestly want to run a newspaper?”

“I’m not interested in dictating the truth to
my readers. I crave nothing more than to make them think, to plant
the one word in their minds that is the root of all wisdom:
why?
The true danger lies in those who profess to have the
only truth and proceed to dictate that to the rest of us. I write
editorials, remember. Not hard news.”

“You write fiction, you mean.”

“You’ve just proved my point. Your truth says
that I create a fantasy. Mine says I create illusions that are
often more true than the facts.”

“I shall have to think about this.”

“You do that.”

“I have a sneaking suspicion I’ve been
bamboozled somewhere along the line.”

He grinned, showing wolfish white teeth,
obviously pleased with himself. Thoughtfully, she traced a finger
across the outlines of crisp dark hair along the sinew of his
forearm.

“You’re pleased at having bested
me—temporarily, I might add—with your golden tongue. You swear that
truth is an illusion, and therefore you have a right to manipulate
it as you see fit. Yet you fought with revolutionaries who, surely,
must have believed theirs was the only reality. You were amazed by
my assumption that you were conning the Van Slykes—you obviously
hadn’t thought of it as such.”

The grin had dropped from his face, to be
replaced with a scowl. “What’s your point?”

“No point, really. Just that your philosophy
is so fully that of a con man, yet you’ve spent the last few years
of your life opposing that fact. You seem rather like a noble
gladiator, waging a battle for the rights of the downtrodden. So...
I ask you, which is the real you?”

He was quiet for a few moments, taking
another sip of wine. He offered it to her, but she shook her head.
“Don’t evade the issue.”

“Shall I tell you a story?” he asked.

“Does it have anything to do with what we’re
talking about? Or is its purpose to distract me?”

“You be the judge.”

“Very well.” She settled back into the
pillows.

“A man was traveling along the road one day
when he came across a snake who’d been badly injured and was on the
verge of dying. Being a kindhearted man, he took the snake home and
cared for him until the snake had fully recovered. At which point,
the viper turned around and bit the man who’d saved his life. As
the man lay dying, he asked the snake, ‘Why did you do that? After
all the love and care I gave you?’ And the reptile replied, ‘What
did you expect? You knew I was a snake when you picked me up.’ ” He
paused, looking up at the canopy. “That’s how I felt when I met
Pilar. I no longer wanted to be that snake.”

“Yet you’re not averse to using your mastery
of the art of deception to help others.”

“We all work with what we’re given.”

“I wonder. Is it right to con someone for a
good cause?”

“Sometimes it’s all you
can
do.”

“Odd, isn’t it? I used to think you were evil
incarnate. That you were cold-bloodedly stealing the newspaper out
from under the Van Slykes. I even thought you killed them. Yet, in
your own way, you’re every bit as compassionate as they were. All
this time I’ve spent with you has shown me one thing: You, Mace
Blackwood, whether you know it or not, are an honorable man.”

“Honorable?” He sounded amused. “There are no
half-measures with you, are there? Loathing or worship... is there
nothing in between?”

“Look what you’ve done for me. You didn’t
have to face what you did. You sacrificed a great deal that I might
feel whole and—happy.”

His mouth curved in a smile, creasing a
dimple deep in the side of his cheek. “It was a great hardship,
spending the night making love to you.”

“Do you know what I think? That you’re more
decent than you like to let on. For some reason, it scares you to
admit that you’re a good man inside. A man of deeply felt emotions.
A man capable of a great deal of caring.”

He laughed. “Oh, you do?”

“I also believe you want the
Globe-Journal
so you can make the Van Slykes’ dream come
true. Only somewhere along the way, it became your dream. And you
became Archer.”

“You think so, do you?”

“You know what else I think?”

“You think your father would approve of
me?”

She bit her lip, considering. “If he got to
know the real you. He’d be a fool not to see that you’re the
perfect man. And my father was no fool.”

He turned on his side, propped himself up on
an elbow, and grinned down at her. “Perfect, am I?”

“Oh, perfection. Considerate and caring with
your clothes on—”

“And with them off?”

“Very... very... dominant in bed.”

“Ah. This is a requirement of your father’s,
then? That the man who wins your hand be dominant in bed?”

“I don’t know about my father... but it’s
certainly one of mine. Most men are so easily manipulated by a
pretty smile that it’s difficult to respect them. But you—you’re
different. Bat once said I’d met my match in you. While I’m not
ready to go that far, I shall admit you’re at least—worthy of
me.”

He gave her a slow grin as his eyes caressed
her lips in a slumberous look that made her heart skip a beat. “You
like dominant men, do you?”

“When I give them permission to be dominant.
And so long as they’re expending their efforts in satisfying me...
and not just themselves.”

“I shall have to bear it in mind.”

“Darling—as far as you’re concerned, I have
no complaints.”

“Ah, but you haven’t seen the best of
me.”

She raised a delighted brow. “Haven’t I,
indeed?”

“We’ve spent so much time playing mental
games with one another that we’ve had precious little time to...
play games in bed, so to speak.”

“Keep talking. I rather like the way you
speak.”

He took her arm and pulled her on top of him.
“Well, we’ve got me all figured out. Perfection personified, wasn’t
it?” he teased. “Now all we have to do is figure out what to do
with you.”

She straddled him, letting her hair fall and
play against his chest. “I have a few suggestions.”

“Such as?”

She wiggled her hips and felt him harden
beneath her. “Why don’t you show me what I’ve been missing? That
is, of course, if you’re not too depleted...”

He extricated himself from her tangle of
limbs and rose from the rumpled bed. “Come here,” he said.

She got up, unconsciously tightening the
wrapper around her waist. She felt an odd tingle of excitement
curling in her toes, trying to anticipate what he had in store for
her. Before, she’d always called the shots with men. It was a
welcome relief to let someone else take over the reins. It was also
a bit like playing blindman’s bluff. She didn’t know what surprise
she might encounter when she turned around.

“You like me dominant, do you?”

“Yes.” The word was like a caress.

In one swift move, he reached behind and
heaved her to him. The air left her lungs.

“Dominant like this?”

Impatiently, he bent his head and took her
breast into his mouth through the thin material of the wrapper. At
the same time, his hands were shoving the covering from the other
breast, baring the ripe, full globe to his view. At once, his mouth
clamped onto her naked flesh, and the wrapper fell unheeded to the
floor.

As he sucked on her breast, his hands found
the downy hair between her thighs. He began to probe with exquisite
skill so she dropped back her head in a helpless gesture. Her mouth
gaped open in a gasp that filled the quiet room. His fingers moved
in her with the dexterity and delicacy of a marksman. There was
nothing hesitant or unsure about him. He moved as if he’d traveled
the map of a woman’s body so often, it was stamped forever in his
mind. As if the journey was as pleasurable, as eagerly anticipated,
as worthy of his wholehearted pursuit, as it had been the first
time around.

“Let me see if I remember those conditions,”
he said, moving to the other breast. “As long as I give you
pleasure... wasn’t that how it went?”

And what pleasure he gave her! His
masterfully roving hands moved in ways she’d never imagined. She
could feel those long, firm fingers sliding up her thighs, parting
the lips, and slipping, one after the other, inside. When he bent
on one knee and put his tongue to her, Saranda could feel the
heated wet flick like a flame. He was an artisan, solicitously
pursuing his craft, stroking, tasting, teasing, insisting. Her
eyes, opening slightly, were as glazed and dreamy as if she were
drunk. She knew how aroused he was—she could feel it in the fervor
with which he devoured her. But still, as if he couldn’t help
himself, he took the time to thoroughly please.

And all the while, when it wasn’t embedded in
her flesh, Mace’s prominent, wolfish mouth moved in a litany of
uttered heat. He spoke to her continually, sometimes grinning,
sometimes mouthing words around a slowly gliding tongue. Saranda
licked her lips and expelled panting breaths. It made her hot just
to hear his deep, lusty voice against her skin. Nothing aroused her
like a man who talked in bed.

He began to whisper orders. “Turn for me just
a bit.” She did as he asked.

“Put your foot on the bed.” She bent a leg
and propped it up on the bed, affording him a better view.

His mouth moved again. She cupped her own
breasts high for his perusal.

He stood after a while, took her waist in his
hands, and lifted her high above his head. Shifting her, he brought
the backs of her knees to rest on his shoulders, straddling him
with her legs spread wide. Then he took hold of her buttocks,
pulled her close, and buried his face in her moist heat. She had to
grab his head to keep from falling backward as his tongue plunged
into her, driving her wild.

She came, straddling the immense breadth of
his shoulders, clutching his crisp black curls.

When she’d barely finished, he eased her back
to the bed, propping her up so she was kneeling, legs spread wide
in the disheveled sheets. Then Mace, in all his rough, hard-muscled
glory, approached her. She put her hands together. She raised them,
still clasped tight, high above her head so her breasts rose and
swayed, and, making undulating motions with her torso, rubbed them
all over his face. He snapped at them and sucked one into his
mouth. As she threw back her head and let out a moan that could be
heard from outside, he reached beneath her knees and gave a sudden
jerk. The muscles in his arms bunched and strained as she flopped
back onto the bed. The backs of her knees in his hands, he spread
them wide, yanked her close, and entered her with a thrust Saranda
felt in places she hadn’t known existed.

Mesmerized, she watched her flesh open and
greedily wrap itself around him. He slid in and out with forceful
thrusts. By now she’d lost control completely and was wallowing in
sensations too explosive to bear for long.

Saranda was so wet, so hair-trigger hot, she
was afraid to move. Mace knew what he wanted, and he went after it
with the same ruthless abandon with which he indicted robber
barons—as if nothing and no one could stand in his way.

He took one leg in his large hand and pulled
it high against his chest, raising her off the bed enough to rest
the calf on his shoulder, letting the other leg fall free. Hanging
on to her raised leg, he slammed into her with such passionate
force that she flopped like a rag doll and, putting her hand over
her mouth, let out a wild, impassioned scream.

He never held one pose for long. With the
prowess of an athlete, he positioned her where he wanted, combining
his acrobatic strength and agility with his vivid imagination to
effect, not merely a quick romp to prove a point, but an artistic
fusing full of power, majesty, and grace. His lovemaking was so
imaginative, so creatively full of sound and fury, that it bordered
on genius. She was swept away by such a maelstrom of emotions, such
a tempest of erotic sensations, that she couldn’t remember the last
time she’d taken a breath.

“Is that what you like?” he asked as he
thrust like a stallion, at the same time fingering the throbbing
bud of her desire.

She felt her orgasm sweeping upon her like a
tidal wave, washing away everything in its path. “Yes,” she gasped,
seeking something to hold on to and, finding nothing, grasping at
the sheets. “Yes... yes...
yes
...”

Several nights later, they were awakened by a
heavy thud. They sat up, hearts pounding, listening in the
darkness. “What was that?” Saranda asked.

“Felt as if we ran ashore.”

He rose and went naked to the window. “Oh,
Christ.”

She was holding the sheet to her breasts.
“What is it?”

“We’ve been stopped by a small steamer.
They’re coming aboard.”

They could hear voices now, abrupt,
commanding voices that rang with the threat of authority. Saranda
knew without being told why the men were here, boarding in the
middle of the night. Rising, she began hurriedly to dress.

Mace pulled on his pants as he kept an ear to
the window.

“What goes on here?” he heard the captain
ask, indignant at the disturbance. Low voices confirmed Mace’s
suspicions, and he quickly pulled on his boots.

“Take a look at this,” they heard a voice
say.

There was a rustle of paper, and they heard
the captain’s startled response. “Why, yes, I believe he
is
on board.”

Saranda had been opening drawers, gathering
fists of clothes. She’d just shoved them in the bag when they heard
footsteps stomping up the companionway.

“What are we going to do?” she asked. “We
haven’t got a gun. We’ll never talk our way out of this.”