To Love a Man (13 page)

“Now it’s my turn,” he threatened, and her smile died as her mouth went dry.

Sam hunkered back on his heels, still straddling her. His turgid flesh burned against the soft inner skin of her bare thigh where her shorts had ridden up. Lisa squirmed instinctively, but Sam held her effortlessly captive between his brown thighs. His hands went slowly, so slowly, to the buttons on her shirt. Lisa moved to help him, but her fingers were impossibly clumsy. He brushed them aside, unfastening the buttons himself. After each one was freed from its hole, he pressed a quick, seductive kiss into her yearning flesh. By the time he had her shirt open, Lisa was moaning audibly. She reached out for him, but he caught her hands, pinning them back against the hard ground. He held her that way, and she was forced to watch, helpless, as his eyes made a meal of her quivering body.

The flesh of her upper body was creamily pale against the faded khaki of her ragged cut-offs and opened shirt; her breasts surged urgently against the silky peach cloth of the flimsy bra as they begged to be released from their confinement. Just above the belted waistline of her shorts, her navel enticed him. . . .

Sam’s eyes feasted on the shape and texture of her. Lisa strained to free herself so that she could pull him closer, but he controlled her abortive movements easily. Her long, pale-gold hair formed a tangled halo around her head against the deeper gold of the long grass crushed beneath her; her eyes were a deep, gleaming green, half-closed and slanted like a cat’s as they begged him. A lovely tawny-pink flush had crept into her high cheekbones; her mouth was as soft and luscious as the reddest rose.

Sam’s heart began to slam against his rib cage in slow, painful thuds. His eyes darkened slumbrously. Lisa, watching these signs of his arousal with an excitement of her own, felt violent tremors snake out over her skin.

Her breath stopped as he bent his head to place his open mouth against her breast. His hot, moist breath burned through her bra to scorch her flesh; his tongue teased the nipple through the silky material. Her eyes closed helplessly; her head thrashed from side to side in tortured longing. She wanted him with a fierceness that shocked her. . . .

His mouth continued to torment her defenseless nipple; she gasped as his hand stroked down her flesh to explore her trembling navel with one hard finger, then continued on across her still-covered abdomen to press intimately between her thighs. She writhed as he touched her, pushing against his hand, helpless to end this torture.

“God,” she heard him mutter. The word sounded strangled. Then his hands were tugging at her shorts, his fingers shaking as he fumbled with the knotted rope that served as her belt. She lifted her hips off the ground, aiding him as he dragged her shorts and panties and shoes off together. Then his big body was upon her, his weight crushing her into the ground as his hands thrust her bra out of the way of his marauding mouth.

“Now,” she cried, moaning, her legs opening to him of their own volition. “Oh, now, Sam, please, now!”

He thrust into her urgently, his hardness impaling her soft flesh. She gasped, and moaned, and cried out his name as her legs wrapped themselves around his waist. Her hands clutched frantically at the thick, rough-silk hair that grew to his nape.

His arms clamped her to him with a bruising strength that would have hurt her if she had been aware of anything besides her body’s desperate need; his groans mingled with her soft cries as he took her with him to the edge of ecstasy and beyond. Lisa’s nails dug into his hard flesh; her body moved with his in a driving dance of passion.

“Yes, yes,
yes
!” she sobbed when at last he drove into her with a force that should have split her in two. He groaned an answer, his face buried in the sweet-smelling hollow of her neck, his body shuddering and throbbing deep inside her. Lisa surged against him, holding him tightly, moaning. Then, with a wonderful melting sensation more pleasurable than anything she had ever known, she quivered and went limp.

It could have been hours or only minutes before she came floating back to earth to feel the sun’s rays beating into her skin. She opened her eyes to find that the patch of shade they had been lying in had shifted with the passage of time, so that she was now ruthlessly exposed to the full glare of the late-afternoon sun. For a long moment she stared down at her body, marveling at her new knowledge of the exquisite sensations of which it was capable. She had never dreamed that she could feel such passion. . . .

She flushed a little as it occurred to her how very wanton she must look, lying nearly naked in the middle of an open field with the glaring light of the African sun playing over her body. Groggily she sat up; her still-fastened bra formed a twisted line from armpit to armpit, and she pulled it down, straightening it with unsteady fingers. Her shirt, now crumpled and sweat stained, still hung loosely from her shoulders; she dragged it across her body. Then she looked around for Sam.

He lay sprawled on his stomach about two feet away. His face was buried in his folded arms, leaving only the back of his black head visible; his long legs were spread slightly apart. The shimmering sunlight gleamed off the dark bronze of his broad back. His buttocks were startlingly white against the rich mahogany of his back and legs. They were rounded and well muscled, and, as she knew from experience, hard to the touch. . . .

Lisa smiled a little as she looked at him. Whatever else he might be, he was a fantastic lover. Hesitant at first, she reached out a hand to touch him, letting her fingers trail over the hard muscles of his upper arm. She wanted him to look at her: she had to know if he felt as wonderful as she did. He didn’t move. More confident now, she stroked his arm from shoulder to the wrist, her fingers finally coming to rest in the hair at his nape. Suddenly his hand shot out to capture hers, holding her wrist as he turned on his side, his free arm moving to prop up his head. He seemed sublimely unconcerned with his own nakedness.

His blue eyes raked over her, their expression impossible to read. With a little tingle of remembered excitement, she saw that a dark flush still mottled his cheeks. She felt a little shy as she remembered the things she had said and done in his arms, and was glad that the shirt shielded the most intimate parts of her body from his gaze. The slender length of her legs was left bare; they were shapely, tanned a light golden brown. His eyes surveyed them from the tips of her small toes to her thighs.

Suddenly he looked up, meeting her eyes. Lisa felt her cheeks grow warm as he studied her face, his eyes lingering on her mouth, which she was sure must still be red and swollen from his kisses. Rather tremulously, she smiled at him. He responded by carrying her hand to his mouth, pressing his lips against the inside of her wrist in a way that sent shivers zinging down to her toes.

“I have to hand it to you, honey,” he drawled, kissing the ends of her fingers one by one. “You’re the best goddamn lay I ever had.”

For one incredulous instant, Lisa could not believe her ears. Then she stiffened in outrage, jerking her hand free of his hold. How could he . . . ? she cried inwardly. How could he insult her so? He laughed at her stricken expression, a taunting sound denoting savage satisfaction. Then he rolled to his feet.

“What were you expecting, moonlight and flowers?” he jibed cruelly. Lisa winced. This couldn’t be happening . . . it was a nightmare. . . . She looked up at him, the pain showing in her eyes. He was standing there, still naked, looking down at her with his fists resting lightly on his hips and a nasty smile curling his mouth.

“I hate you,” she whispered venomously. His smile widened, but his eyes were as hard as diamonds as they raked her where she crouched half-naked in the grass.

“Honey, I love the way you hate,” he taunted. Lisa shut her eyes, wanting to block out the sight of this mocking savage who just minutes before had been her lover. She bit her lip to stem hot words of invective. She wanted to kill him—and she couldn’t. She wanted to make him suffer—and she didn’t have the power. She was helpless against the sadistic son of a bitch. . . .

“You have grass in your hair,” he said, his voice heavy with contempt, and bent to pick it out. Lisa jumped to her feet, knocking his hand aside. Then, before she thought, she slapped him full in his mocking face.

“Why, you . . .” he bit out, grabbing her wrist and holding it in a vise grip. Lisa should have been frightened, she knew, but she wasn’t. She was too damned mad. . . .

“You deserved that,” she spat, her eyes blazing on his face. His hand tightened punishingly.

“For what?” he asked softly. “For taking what you’ve been dying to give me for days? You started this thing today, babe, not me. You were hotter than a bitch in heat, and if you’re honest you’ll admit it.”

Lisa glared at him, hating him more than she had ever hated anyone in her life. If she could have willed him to drop dead on the spot, she would have. The horrible thing about it was, he was right. She had initiated their coupling, and she had been hot for him—but did he have to make it sound so—so impossibly nasty?

“Cat got your tongue?” he taunted. Lisa shook the tumbled mass of curls out of her eyes, her chin tilting up proudly.

“Would you please let go of my wrist?” she asked with icy politeness. “You’re hurting.”

“You slapped me,” he reminded her softly. Lisa could see the dark red imprint of her fingers against his brown cheek. She hoped, with a viciousness that was usually foreign to her, that it hurt.

“You deserved it,” she insisted stubbornly. He smiled, but his expression was not pleasant.

“I ought to slap you back.”

“That’s just the kind of thing you would do,” Lisa answered with a contempt that matched his.

His eyes narrowed; he gave a sharp little tug on her wrist that sent her tumbling against him. He caught her, holding her an unwilling prisoner against his hard body. Lisa pushed furiously at his chest, but she might just as well have pushed at the Empire State Building: he didn’t budge.

“You can pay me back in the way you’re best at,” he said softly.

Lisa glared at him; then, reading his intention in his eyes, she averted her face. He laughed unpleasantly; one arm continued to clamp her to him while his other hand came up to capture her unwilling chin. With ridiculous ease he turned her face up to his. Lisa knew what he meant to do, knew what direction his revenge would take, but she was powerless to prevent him. Against his strength she felt like a little child. He smiled down at her tauntingly, clearly reveling in her helplessness. Lisa stood rigidly as he slowly lowered his mouth to hers, her fists clenched against his chest, her every muscle stiff with outrage.

He kissed her roughly, hurting her, seeming to want to hurt her. Lisa suffered his prying invasion of her mouth because she could do nothing else. But when his hand slid up under her shirt and bra to close on her bare breast, she began to fight him, her small fists beating ineffectually against his chest, her legs kicking at his shins.

He laughed exultantly as her nipple hardened in instinctive reaction to his massaging palm. His mouth moved away from her bruised lips to ravage the silken cord of her neck.

“Come on, baby, beg me,” he muttered outrageously against her skin. “You just might be able to talk me into giving it to you again. . . .”

Lisa gasped. Rage and humiliation combined to give her an extra measure of strength as she fought to be free. He controlled her struggles easily. When at last she stood quietly in his hold, panting and subdued but still rigid with fury, his hands began a slow, insolent exploration of her body. He watched her as he stroked her most intimate places with a familiarity designed to be offensive. Lisa quivered with mortification; her eyes flashed disgust at him.

“I hate you,” she whispered finally, as the fingers of one big hand searched for and found the secret recesses of her body. “No!”

This last startled cry came as his hands left their occupation to cup her buttocks, lifting her from the ground. Then they slid down to close on the backs of her upper thighs, parting her legs so that he stood braced between them. Off balance, her hands instinctively clutched at his shoulders. Before she had quite registered his intention, he thrust inside her. Then it was too late.

Lisa’s rage strangled any passion she might have felt. She cursed him as he took her, her fists doubling to beat at whatever part of him she could reach.

After her first blow, he tilted her back away from him so that she could not reach his face, his hands clamped tightly around her waist. His possession was swift and brutal, a savage act of aggression. Lisa could do nothing but endure.

When at last he allowed her to slide limply down his body, Lisa was forced to lean against him for a moment before she could summon the strength to jerk away. He let her go. She moved a couple of paces from him; her eyes lighted on the pistol, which lay where he had dropped it in the tall grass.

Moving casually, she stepped toward it. When she was close enough, she dropped her pretense of nonchalance and swooped on it, snatching it up and turning to point it at him in one quick movement. Using both hands, she held it stiffly out before her in the way he had taught her; its mouth was pointed directly at his flat belly. Then she looked straight at him, smiling. Murder was in her eyes and in her heart.

VII

S
URPRISE
and something else flickered in Sam’s eyes for just an instant as he eyed first the pistol and then her flushed face. Lisa glared back at him with a mixture of anger and triumph. At last she had the arrogant so-and-so where she wanted him. The tables were turned with a vengeance!

She had to admit that he did not look particularly worried. He was standing there with his fists resting lightly on his lean hips; the slight breeze ruffled his black hair and his head was cocked a little to one side like that of an inquisitive bull dog. Perspiration gleamed on his chest and shoulders; his body hair curled damply into little ringlets. He seemed totally unconcerned with his nakedness, and this annoyed Lisa.