with Cole. I was arrested for harboring bushwhackers!'
'The Slater men haven't done much for you, have they?' he murmured quietly.
'I didn't mind that. Cole saved us. I always liked Cole. From the first moment I saw him.'
Just like she always hated me, Malachi thought. He smoothed back a strand of her hair. What the hell was he doing here? He'd never been that much of a gentleman. Why had he let her go when she was welcoming him against her? He sighed softly.
'It was awful,' Shannon said, shivering. 'They had so many of us, stuffed into that terrible decrepit building. When the roof collapsed…' She paused. 'I thought I was going to die. I was just hanging through the roof when the rafters broke apart. I could hear everyone screaming. And then Robert was there. He and Kristin made me jump. And he caught me. He was so brave and wonderful—a hero. I'll never forget looking into his eyes then. And then… then we heard all the screams again. Five of the women were killed. So many were hurt badly… It was odd. We were friends then, all of us. The other girls knew where my sympathies really lay, and they understood. Josephine Anderson was my friend. When she died, her brother went mad. That's when he really became Bloody Bill, after she died. Oh, Malachi! So many people died!'
'It's all right,' he said softly. She was crying. Not sobbing hysterically, just crying very quietly. 'It's all right,' he said again.
He kept stroking her hair. She didn't speak again, and he didn't speak, either. He closed his eyes, just holding her. It was too painful for any of them to think of the war. Northerner, Southerner, it was just too damned painful to look back. Great men, kind men, good men, all of them dead. Gallant men, alone and moldering in gallant graves. He sighed and closed his eyes. He couldn't let it go on any longer. He had to find some way to free Kristin.
And then he had to find his brothers.
And run.
He opened his eyes. The candles were burning low. He had drifted to sleep. The room was cast in very soft shadows, and the light was pale and ethereal.
He wondered why he had awakened. Then he knew.
Her fingers were moving over his chest. Her nails lightly raked his flesh, and her hair fell over him like a brush with angel's wings. She traced tentative, soft patterns over him, exploring his rib cage and breast and collarbone.
He lay still. He kept his eyes open a slit, watching her. She rose slightly, watching him, watching the movement of her fingers. Her breasts peeked out from the golden glory of her long hair, and as she watched her fingers moving over him, she lightly moistened her lips with the tip of her tongue.
I'll be damned if I'll be a gentleman, he thought. Even cavaliers and knights of old surely had their needs.
He reached out, catching her hand where it lay over his heart. Her eyes darted to his in alarm.
'Go on. Touch me,' he whispered.
'I—I didn't mean to wake you,' she stuttered. They were both whispering. She must have known that he could not let her go, not this time. She was exquisite in the light, her breasts full and firm and ripe and her skin silky, shining in the candles' pale glow. Her eyes were so very blue…
'I'm awake,' he told her.
'I've disturbed you—'
'Disturb me further, darlin'…please.' His eyes remained locked with hers. He drew her hand along the length of his body. He heard her breath go ragged in her throat and her eyes followed the motion of their hands with a deadly fascination. Her fingers trailed over his flesh, over the soft hair that nestled around his sex. She tensed, and he felt her trembling. He sensed a certain fear within her, but he held her tight. She curved her hand around it hesitantly.
Rockets seemed to burst within his head and into his body. She gasped softly as she felt him swell huge and hard. She cried out softly. He reached up, slipping his hand around her neck to cup her head. He rose up on an elbow and kissed her slowly and fully, taking her lips, releasing them, hovering over them again just to brush them with the taste of his mouth and the seductive jut of his tongue.
Then he laid her flat and crawled aggressively over her. He kissed her again, easing away her hesitance.
He felt her fingers upon his shoulders again. Her body found a slow undulation beneath his. He set his hand upon her breast, and followed his touch with his kiss. He stroked her thighs and invaded her intimately with his touch.
With raw purpose he moved his body in a slow, bold sweep down the length of hers. He kept his eyes hard upon hers until he came to the juncture of her thighs, when he replaced his intimate touch there with the searing violation of his tongue.
She called out his name in a gasp as he brought her to the very edge of ecstasy, then withdrew. He found her eyes once more and she choked out incomprehensible words, reaching for him. She pulled him to her, seeking his shoulders with her lips and teeth. He pushed away again, demanding that she meet his eyes as he parted her thighs with the wedge of his knee and thrust deep and swiftly inside her.
She shuddered and whispered his name again.
That night, he gave little heed to finesse, and passion rose like a tempest within him. He caught her lips again with a savage passion, and as their bodies arched in an urgent rhythm, he caressed her with rough and demanding hunger.
Her legs wrapped high around him and her kisses fell upon him as she tasted the textures of his face and his throat. Her fingers trailed down his back to knot into the rigid muscles of his buttocks. At the end he cast back his head as a fierce shudder gripped his body, a hoarse cry escaping his lips. She sobbed out in turn, barely aware of the night, of time or place, barely conscious of reality.
Seconds later, she felt his touch, so absurdly gentle once again. Their harsh breathing could still be heard, and they were both covered in a soft sheen. 'Malachi—'
'It's all right,' he said gently. 'You don't have to say anything.' He lay back, bringing her down beside him. He whispered softly against her ear. 'Just don't think to hop up and leave me. Don't deny me.'
She lay there in silence. The darkness closed around them as the last of the candles burned out.
Much later, they crawled beneath the sheet. Shannon knew a moment of panic at this new intimacy, but then she relaxed again. There was nothing left to fear for that night. She hadn't meant what had happened. At least she didn't think that she did. She had thought he slept soundly, and she had not been able to resist temptation.
And temptation had definitely led to sin, she thought.
With his arms closed around her, she felt as if she might start crying again, because it felt so good. His arms offered warmth and security and a steel-hard strength, and she found she loved that. Just as she was coming to love the slant of his grin. And the way he would never let a man—or a woman—down. He had his code of honor.
And in his sweeping way, he was a cavalier.
She loved his courage, and his daring, just as she was coming to love the bronzed power of his arms, holding her close now. Just as she was coming to love the breadth of his golden-matted chest, and the hard, muscled length of his thighs…
And his impossible, immoral intimacy. She could not believe the way that he had touched and caressed her, and neither could she believe the sweet, unbearable ecstasy that he brought her with his sheer decadent purpose and determination. She was coming to care for him too much…
'Malachi,' she whispered softly.
'What?' He moved his hand gently against her, beneath her breasts, idly, tenderly upon them.
'Have you ever been in love?'
He went still, then he moved away from her, his arm over his forehead as he rolled to his back, staring at the ceiling. 'Yes. Once. Why?'
'I just… wondered.''
He grunted, giving her no further answer.
'Malachi?'
'Yes?'
'Who was she?'
'A girl.' It was a short, terse answer. He sighed. 'It was a long, long time ago.'
