Night Flower (Gone-to-Texas Trilogy) (45 page)

      
When he reached her room, he opened the door and carried her inside to the bed, where he deposited her. It was rather small but would serve, he decided as he turned and quickly closed the door, sliding the bolt against any unexpected intrusion.

      
Melanie sat on the edge of her bed, watching the movements of his lean, pantherish body avidly, making no attempt to conceal her interest. When she began to unfasten the buttons of her blouse with unsteady fingers, he brushed them aside, saying, “Here, let me.”

      
Slowly, Lee unbuttoned the silk blouse, peeling the sheer fabric back to reveal the rich swell of her golden breasts, barely shielded by a lacy camisole. He slipped his fingertips inside and teased the dark rosy crests until they hardened into points. Her breath caught at the tingling pleasure and she gasped, arching into his caress. When he pulled the open jacket and blouse off, she helped him, shrugging them carelessly from her shoulders, languorously baring her flesh for his hands and lips.

      
“Raise your legs—one at a time, Mellie,” he commanded as he knelt by the side of the bed and removed her delicate kid slippers and silk stockings. Then, he pulled her up to stand in his arms so he could unfasten her suit skirt and the tapes to her petticoats. She wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him ardently while his fingers worked deftly until the whole weight of her skirts slithered to the floor.

      
Lee stood back and spanned her tiny waist with his hands. “So perfect, so delicate, like a small, golden figurine,” he breathed as he slid his fingers up and unhooked her camisole, freeing her breasts. Lifting one in each hand, he lowered his head and suckled, alternating between them until she cried out her pleasure in a wordless, incoherent moan. Then, he laid her back on the bed to watch him as he stripped.

      
He seemed to shimmer before her eyes like a bronzed god, lean corded muscles flexing as he shrugged off his shirt and reached to unfasten his trousers. With her eyes, she traced the intricate symmetry of his curly black body hair, longing to feel the crisp, springy texture of it rubbing against her skin. When he kicked off his boots and peeled down fitted buckskin breeches from his long hard legs, she stared unashamedly at the swollen proof of his desire, feeling a quivering response between her legs.

      
“Lee,” she breathed softly as he sank down alongside her on the narrow bed. He quickly unfastened her pantalets and pulled them down her sleek little legs. She raised her buttocks and helped him free her of the unwanted encumbrance of clothing. Then, his hand fastened around one delicately slim ankle. He raised it and leaned over to kiss the arch of her foot, trailing soft nibbling kisses along the curve of her calf, over the back of her knees, then up the inside of her thigh.

      
His fingers grazed the soft inky curls between her legs. “You're wet and sweet with passion, Night Flower,” he breathed as he lowered his mouth to kiss and caress where his hands had just been. She arched up in frenzied pleasure, her head tossing from side to side in wild abandon. His tongue flicked and teased at the sweet, silky core of her until he could feel the pulsating waves of her orgasm. He raised his head and watched her writhe and quiver in ecstasy, then kissed a scorching trail up her belly to her breasts as he positioned himself between her legs.

      
Still in a haze from the aftershock of intense pleasure, Melanie opened to him as he plunged into her with a harsh, rasping cry, betraying the cost of holding back his own release. He stroked frantically for a moment, then gradually regained control of his desperate hunger, slowing his pace to long, languorous caresses. She arched to meet him and her nails dug into his biceps, pulling him down to her eager, open mouth.

      
The cool night air was heavy with the heady, dizzying scent of their lovemaking. It intoxicated her even more than Obedience's liquor had. Melanie felt him tense and shiver with the aching need to spill his seed. Crying out his name from deep in her throat, she kissed him fiercely and tightened her legs around his hips for a last hard, long explosion.
Again, again
. She never knew if she spoke the words aloud or not; but she could feel his swelling, pulsing climax as he joined her in surfeit, collapsing on top of her soft, small body.

      
They clung to each other in the quiet of the night, sweat-soaked and panting. Finally, he rolled his greater weight from her and pulled her to curl against his side. She sighed and fell instantly asleep. For a long while he watched her in the moon-drenched silence of the small room before drifting off himself.

      
When the bright rays of autumn sunlight filtered across the bed, Lee opened his eyes and blinked. It was well past dawn. Raising himself up carefully on one elbow, he looked down at her small, beautiful face, so serene and youthful in repose. Quickly, he thought of the headache she'd have upon arising. Perhaps, explanations were better left until after this mess was settled with Walkman and Blaine. Still, he couldn't just leave her without a word. Softly he kissed her eyelids, cheeks, lips, feathering light kisses across her face until she opened her eyes.

      
Melanie looked up at her husband's smiling face, darkened by a bristling shadow of beard. ‘‘You look like a bandit,” she said. Her voice surprised her with its raspy edge. Then, when she turned her head and tried to rise, she plopped abruptly back down. “Ooh! God, what was in that stuff! Stella Wolcott is right! I'll never again drink anything stronger than coffee!”

      
She could feel the bed rock from his laughter, and it added to her aching misery. Melanie struggled to remember what had happened last night after the first two drinks of that wicked brew Obedience fed her. She had a shadowy recollection of Lee's arrival and Obedience's abrupt departure. After that, he had spoken to her in the office and she had told him—what? Gingerly, she rubbed her aching head, but could not remember. She did remember their wildly abandoned loving, his tenderness. Something more niggled at the periphery of her consciousness, but she could not dredge it up. Then she felt his fingertips graze her cheek and turn her chin so that she was forced to look into his eyes.

      
“Mellie, last night I learned some things,” he began hesitantly, uncertain of how to phrase what he wanted to say. Seeing the wary, withdrawing expression that began to shutter her eyes, he leaned down and kissed her lightly on the lips. “Don't pull away from me again. I know now—”

      
Just then a sharp knock sounded on the door. Swearing under his breath, Lee tossed back the covers and reached over to the crumpled heap of his buckskin breeches, which had been tossed in a corner. The whole room was strewn with their hastily discarded clothing. As he donned his pants, the rap sounded again. Barefoot and bare-chested, he strode across the room and slid the bolt on the door. He was greeted by the grim face of Jeremy Lawrence.

      
“What the hell are you doing here?” Lee demanded furiously as he noted the tall ranger's eyes traveling past him to the bed where Melanie sat with the covers pulled up to her neck.

      
Lawrence shifted his gaze quickly back to the scowling, furious man in front of him. “I figured you'd be here since you said you were coming to town when I left you at Bluebonnet yesterday afternoon. One of my scouts just came to get me. Seems he spotted Zeb Brocker and a couple of Gall's braves creeping around your herd. He thinks they might hit tonight. We need to get the men lined up and alert Slade.”

      
“I’ll be right down. You ride to get Jim. I'll head for Night Flower and check with my men to see what they know.” Lee quickly closed the door as Lawrence turned and departed. Looking at Melanie's wide-eyed fright and confusion, he cursed the rotten turn of events. They had laid out the bait for Walkman and had waited for weeks.
Of all the miserable timing—now the bastard comes after it!

      
“Jeremy told me you were working together to catch Blaine and Walkman, but he wouldn't say anything specific. What's going on, Lee?” She leaped from the bed, ignoring her usual modesty and the pounding in her head. Walking over to a small chest, she opened a drawer and began to pull out some lacy underwear.

      
“You're staying here,” he said flatly, ignoring her question as he pulled on shirt and boots. His face bore a hard, shuttered look that she recognized immediately.

      
“Why should I? I've been waiting for this story for weeks,” she replied angrily as she slid her riding skirt on and reached for a blouse.

      
“You are staying here, Mellie, because I'm your husband and I say so. It's going to be dangerous and no reporter—male or female—is going to get in the way before the trap is sprung,” he added, struggling for patience.

      
“I could at least wait at the ranch,” Melanie retorted.

      
He reached over and whirled her around, holding her tightly by her shoulders. “You stay here.” He bit off each word.

      
“What will you do if I refuse, Lee? Lock me in a closet?”

      
He gritted his teeth in fury. “I'm considering it. What do you think you can do—shoot Comanches?”

      
“I don't want to shoot anyone. I just want to get the story.”
I want to be with you and see that you're safe,
she suddenly realized.

      
Lee was already out the door, calling over his shoulder, “Stay in town. Moses French has retired!”

      
“The hell you say,” she muttered under her breath. Did he really want her to stay here out of concern for her safety? Or did he just want her out of the way, not complicating his life now that their lovemaking idyll of last night had ended? If only Jeremy hadn't interrupted. She knew Lee had been about to say something revealing to her. But what?

      
Pushing aside her brooding, confused thoughts, she finished dressing and raced down to the stables to get Liberator.

      
Gradually, Melanie calmed down and began to think more logically about a plan of action. Jeremy hadn't said where the herd that they were using as bait was located. Night Flower was an enormous ranch. She could ride around for hours and not find the right spot, or worse yet, blunder onto the Comanche and get herself killed or captured. Now that Lee was gone, she was left with a cold trail.

      
But Jeremy had gone to Bluebonnet to warn Jim. Maybe Charlee knew something! At least it was a lead. As she rode briskly through the deserted streets in the early morning light, Melanie did not know the cold gray eyes of Seth Walkman watched her from behind the window of his hotel room. “Where the hell is that little bitch going this time of the morning?” he muttered to himself as he stretched and scratched his bare chest. Too bad she wouldn't be at her husband's ranch tonight. Gall would enjoy her. He chuckled mirthlessly to himself as he dressed.

* * * *

      
Jarvis Phelps was nervous. He fidgeted with his glasses, polishing and repolishing them as he watched Laban Greer go through the deeds—those very same land titles that shameless female reporter had asked to see yesterday. Should he tell Mr. Greer or not? Phelps was afraid to meddle in the powerful speculator's business. He was also smart enough to figure that the business wasn't altogether legal, but that was not his affair. Still, he didn't like meddlesome females, especially ones who were Indian lovers and temperance crusaders to boot.

      
“Er, Mr. Greer.” Phelps cleared his throat uncertainly. “There's something I think you might want to know....”

      
Within five minutes Greer had located Seth Walkman at the Golden Nugget Saloon, hunched over a breakfast of greasy fried potatoes and silty black coffee. Looking around to see if they were observed, he noted with satisfaction that the fat old Mexican cook had returned to the kitchen out back and the Irish bartender was more interested in swatting flies with his dish towel than in drying the glasses from last night's business.

      
“What you want at this piss-ass hour?” Walkman snarled, knowing whatever it was that brought Laban Greer to town this early could bode no good for either of them.

      
“That damnable female reporter, Melanie Velasquez, has been snooping around the land office, asking to see the title transfers for Ryan's and Broughton's places, among others that I've acquired in the past several years,” Greer said levelly.

      
Walkman's eyes narrowed. “ ‘N we got Blaine and his Injuns fixin' to raid her husband's place tonight. I don't like it, Laban.”

      
Greer scratched his jaw slowly. “They're estranged. I've heard rumors that the marriage was a shotgun affair. She's lived and worked here in town while he's running his ranch. This may just be a coincidence, especially considering her penchant for crusades; but it's best not to take a chance. Deal with her as soon as you can find a clean chance when she's alone.”

      
Walkman's gray eyes glowed ferally. “Now, that might just be real easy. Not half hour ago I seen her ride out of town—alone.”

      
Melanie paced Liberator steadily as she rode toward Bluebonnet, turning over and over last night's events in her mind. Her head was finally beginning to clear from the effects of the alcohol as she breathed in the cool, crisp fall air. She reviewed every word Lee had spoken, every nuance of his behavior, trying to decide what he had been preparing to tell her when they were interrupted.
Do I dare hope that he loves me? Or am I just reading meanings into his words and actions?
She scoffed to herself, realizing how Stella Wolcott would castigate her for last night's debauch. “I wonder if poor Stella's ever been in love,” she murmured aloud to Liberator.