The coffee pot was belching out little puffs of fragrant smoke. Amelia had placed one of the kitchen chairs discreetly off to the end of the stove, and J.D. could see her dress and various unidentifiable white frilly things draped over its back to dry. Amelia herself was standing at the big window by the door, with her forehead and one of her palms resting against the glass as she gazed out into the storm. He hovered indecisively in the middle of the floor for a moment, watching her, then hesitantly asked, "You all right?"
She straightened up and turned to face him, tugging the makeshift shawl more closely around her. "I'm not quite sure yet. There aren't as many ghosts here as I thought there would be, but..."
Trailing off, she finished the sentence with a shrug and changed the subject. "The coffee should be ready now."
She had set a couple of tin cups and a little jar of sugar on the table. Retrieving the pot from the stove, she filled both cups, then took one and went over to settle into a big rocking chair in front of the empty fireplace. While J.D. was helping himself to sugar, adding an extra measure to make up for the lack of milk, she examined his attire and commented, "They fit better than I thought."
"Yeah, not too bad," he agreed, self-consciously. Coming over, he started to sit down on the edge of the hearth, discovered that wasn't a smart idea in too-tight dungarees and seated himself atop a low wooden table instead. "So what now? You found anything you want to take back home with you?"
"I haven't looked yet," she admitted, gazing down into her cup. "When I decided to come out here, the practical side of me thought it would be a waste of time, because everything of mine would be long gone. But... nothing has changed. It's as though I just walked out the door yesterday. That time was so hard for me, I got rid of anything that reminded me of the past as soon as I could, but... but when I think back upon the sort of man Sam was, I realize it was foolish to think he'd do the same. I must have hurt his pride, but that was never as strong as his practicality. He wasn't one to replace something while there was still use to be had out of it. I imagine he stormed about until he'd convinced himself the blame was entirely mine, then simply forgot about me and got on with his life."
"Can't believe a man could ever forget you."
"You didn't know Sam Johnson."
"Glad I didn't," J.D. admitted, gazing at her profile. "Can't think I'd've liked him very much."
"Nor did I," Amelia said quietly.
Rising abruptly to her feet, she went to the stove and busied herself resettling her clothes on the chair so they would dry evenly. When that was done, she just puttered around, looking in cupboards and on shelves, always keeping her back to him. "At least we shan't starve while we wait for the road to dry out," she told him a few minutes later. "Sam must've done a supply run not too long before he died. There's plenty of tins, and nothing's gotten into the flour. And I think I saw a smoked ham out back in the woodshed..." She paused, then reached into one of the cupboards and slowly pulled out a small teapot. It was one of the fancy kind, china white with a dusting of little red flowers, but it looked too old to be of much good to anyone. There was a pattern of cracks down one side of its surface, more apparent when Amelia had used a corner of her shawl to wipe away its thick coating of dust.
"My mother gave this to me when I married Sam. Her great-grandmother brought it with her from England... I suppose it's the only family heirloom I shall ever have..." She set the small object down gently beside the picnic basket, then covered her face with her hands. "I was wrong, J.D. There are memories here." Oh, Lord.... If he didn't know much about consorting with women, he knew even less about consoling them. Mama's nature had been as sunny and optimistic as his own, and she'd faced her life, troubles and all, with far more laughter than tears. The few times he could remember her crying, he'd just held her in his arms until she worked things out for herself, never believing her when she told him afterwards that it was all the comfort she could ever need.
He stayed where he was for a moment, fidgeting anxiously while he struggled with what to do. A cowardly little voice inside suggested a check on the horses in the barn, but while J.D. might not have denied it if someone called him foolish, he prided himself that he was never a coward. If he was, he wouldn't be here in the first place. He put his half-finished coffee down on the table beside him, then got up and crossed the room. Coming up behind Amelia, he laid his hands very hesitantly on her shoulders. She wasn't really crying, or else she was doing it utterly silently, but he could feel ragged tremors passing through her body.
"Amelia...?" She had given him permission to call her that, but it was the first time he'd said it aloud, even though it was how he'd thought of her almost from the beginning.
"Please, don't... Everything's all right." He knew that sounded stupid, but he couldn't think of anything better to say. With rain still coming down outside in torrents, he couldn't even offer to take her back to town, to get her away from this part of her past.
"You're very patient with me," she murmured, so softly that the words were almost lost in the half-forgotten background din of the storm, "considering that I've yelled at you and gotten you nearly drowned and dumped in a mud puddle and now I'm crying all over you."
"You ain't crying all over me," J.D. pointed out, still not quite sure about whether she was crying at all. She was trembling, and her voice didn't sound quite right, but she wasn't bawling or sniffling or anything else that he associated with that activity. "You got your back to me."
It hadn't--exactly--been a suggestion, but in a moment, he found her in his arms, her face buried in his shoulder while her slender frame shook with near-silent sobs. Holding her was a bit awkward, what with her being just enough taller that they didn't quite fit together like that, so he walked her carefully over to a wooden bench pushed up against the wall, and eased both of them down on it. Then he just held her silently, one arm around her, the other hand sliding up and down her back in a soothing way. It didn't even occur to him to be flustered or embarrassed or aroused by the casual intimacy of the contact. For once, it just felt as though he was doing something that was completely, perfectly right.
Hardly any time passed before Amelia grew silent and still against him. Her eyes remained closed, tears beaded up in her lashes and forming soft trails down her cheeks. Peering down at her, J.D. noticed for the first time the bruised hollowness around her eyes.
As though she'd become aware of his scrutiny, Amelia sat up suddenly. Pulling the shawl closer, she let her head sag forward until her profile was hidden within a veil of chestnut hair. "When was the last time you got a good night's sleep?" J.D. asked.
"Oh... I suppose the night before Mr. Gainer's telegram arrived."
"You oughta go lie down for a while. We got all tonight to look around."
Amelia raised her head, took one mute look at the bedroom door, then shook her head. Thinking about the implication made J.D. blush again, and not just because he'd put his foot in his mouth.
"That rocker looks big enough to sleep in," he counter-offered. "I could start a fire and bring you a blanket."
She went without protest when he slipped a hand under her elbow and led her to the rocking chair. He settled her into it, then brought a pillow from the bedroom and a quilt to tuck around her. Running his fingers across the bright patterning of the quilt, he asked, "You make this?" then smiled when she nodded, and added, "It's real pretty."
"I never could get the stitches even," she murmured, closing her eyes. "My mother despaired of my needlework."
When he got back from the woodshed with an armload of sticks, she was already asleep. Finally releasing all the tension that had been wound up inside her since she'd stepped off the stage must have completely exhausted her. She didn't stir or open her eyes all the time he was laying out the fire in the grate. When he had it burning evenly, he settled down in the second chair by the hearth, listening to the rain and the wind, watching Amelia sleep while he remembered the feel of her in his arms--her warmth, the pliant softness of female skin covered by no more than a thin layer of cotton. At the time, he'd been so caught up in her misery that he hadn't once thought about it. Hadn't even noticed it.
Unlike the harsh, unruly cravings that had been riding him all week, the memory was surprisingly sweet and warm. Even so, playing it back in his mind made him feel it through all his senses in a way that threatened to get him right back where he didn't want to be. He wished he'd brought along a book or something to distract himself, then finally settled for retrieving his clothes from the bedroom and carrying them out to the washtub in the shed. He rinsed the mud out of them the best he could, then laid them out on a second chair by the stove to dry. When that was done, he retrieved his gunbelt, pulled the low wooden table over closer in front of his chair, then went and hunted around in the bedroom until he found an old towel with a hole in it which he figured Amelia wouldn't mind him taking. He tore off some strips to use as cleaning rags, spread the remains on the table, and put his pistols down on it. A hunting rifle and a shotgun hung on a rack above the mantel. They showed signs of on-going care so he knew there was gun oil around somewhere, and a brief search through the likely places turned it up. Settling back down by the fire, he set to work, disassembling his pistols for a thorough cleaning and oiling to be sure they didn't rust.
He lingered over the task, which was becoming a familiar and comfortable part of his life. The biggest portion of the money his mother had bequeathed to him lay right there in his hands. The Colt Lightnings, with their fancy ivory handles and newly patented double-action firing mechanisms, were the most expensive thing he'd ever bought--more than the price of Mama's grave marker or the ticket that had brought him here, more than the cost of his saddle and his little bay mare combined.
He had finished drying out all the pieces of the weapons and rubbing them over with gun oil when he realized he was being watched. Once he noticed it, he decided that the odd, itchy awareness had been there for some time. He glanced up quickly, thinking it was just his imagination, but Amelia's blue eyes were open, her gaze fixed on his hands.
"'M sorry," he said uncomfortably. "I didn't even ask if guns bother you. They gotta be taken care of, but I could go out on the porch...?"
"It's so wet out there that there wouldn't be much point." She shook her head and smiled. "They don't bother me. I grew up out here, remember? Besides, I'm enjoying watching you."
"Um..." J.D.'s brows drew together in a pensive frown. "Why?"
"I like the way your hands move," she told him. "You have really beautiful hands."
He tilted his head to the side and looked down at his oil-stained fingers, wondering what on earth she meant by that. His wrists were so narrow that they looked deceptively weak, and his long, thin fingers were almost womanish, an annoying fact that was becoming more obvious now that he'd stopped doing manual labor and the calluses were softening.
He tried to go on with what he'd been doing, but actions that had been simple and straightforward only a moment earlier now seemed awkward. He dropped the piece of oily rag he was using, failed to snag it before it sailed off the edge of the table, and nearly succeeded in sending the disassembled Colts scattering after it.
Muttering, "Damn!" so softly that he knew there was no danger of Amelia hearing him, he retrieved the rag. As he dropped it down beside the pistols, Amelia burst out laughing. J.D. flushed in embarrassment, until he realized her eyes were so warm and merry that she was simply enjoying the scene, not laughing at him. But then, she never had, not even when he felt so stupid and awkward that he was about ready to fling himself off the nearest cliff.
"You must be feeling a mite better," he ventured, carefully picking up the frame of one of the pistols, and managing to slide the cylinder back into place on only the third or fourth try. She seemed to think about the comment for a while before she finally answered it. "I suppose I am. And I am awfully sorry to make such a fool of myself."
J.D. tilted his head again, confused. "What?"
"Falling to pieces like that. It's very embarrassing." "Why?" he asked, frowning. "I mean, you being a lady and all, why would you...?"
"In the general way of it, I'm not a tiresome, weepy sort of female." She gave him a quick, abashed little smile which made him realize she genuinely was flustered. It had never even occurred to him that she might worry about acting foolishly in front of him. Everything between them had seemed to run so completely in the other direction. The simple notion made him feel better, because it seemed to almost land them on even footing.
"Are all the women of your acquaintance given to crying on your shoulder at frequent intervals?" Amelia inquired, with a hint of wry amusement.
"Ain't been around many women," J.D. told her, then realized how that sounded and hastily amended, "I mean, of course I've been around tons of women and everything, but not regular like. I mean, it ain't like I've been married or..." Adding, Oh, Lord, silently, he let the tangle of words run down before he dug himself in any deeper. So much for even footing.
He concentrated on sliding the final few pieces of metal back together and locking it all into place. Even with her watching him, that activity suddenly seemed very straightforward. The gunbelt needed oiling, too, but he just shoved the pistols back into their holsters and left it lying there as he bounced to his feet.
"I better go get some more wood, 'fore the fire goes out," he announced, and headed for the door.
When he got back, Amelia had collected the coffee cup he'd abandoned earlier and her own, and returned them to the kitchen. While he was kneeling to fix the fire, she came over to stand by the hearth.
"I didn't think things would work out like this. I didn't know it would be so difficult."
"A little rainwater ain't going to drown us." He knew damned well that wasn't what she meant. He fussed with the wood until the fire was burning so high that it was close to broiling him, but Amelia still hadn't moved so he finally had to stand up and face her. After a soaking and a spit-bath, she didn't smell of apple blossoms, but every time she got this close to him, his memory supplied the sweet, light scent that was part of her in his mind.
"I should go check on the horses--"
Amelia made a tiny, sharp sound in her throat and laid her hand on his chest. "Please don't. We need to talk about this." "There ain't nothing to talk about," he shot back in a voice so strained that it cracked like a kid's.
She gave him the oddest, most unreadable look, then nodded her head.
"Perhaps you're right."
Amelia took a step forward until there was no room between them at all, then before he had time to realize what she was going to do, her lips reached out to his. J.D. sucked in a startled breath, his whole body suddenly rigid. His hands came up to touch her, then fell back to hover uncertainly at his sides. He'd never kissed a woman in his life, and he'd only once been kissed by one, when Emily had grabbed him by the lapels in the middle of the street and done things to his mouth that had somehow made his knees turn to water. Amelia's kiss was nothing like that--it was all warm and light and sweet--but it still made his legs so unsteady that he had to take a half-step backwards until he had the comforting support of the hearth stones against his back. Amelia went with him, settled in against him so that he was aware her all the way from his throat to his thighs, most especially the soft pressure where her breasts flattened against his chest, and the triangle of warmth that cradled his groin. Her mouth opened slightly against his, and the tip of her tongue flicked out to slowly trace the outline of his lips. For one absurd moment, J.D. thought she wanted to do what Emily had done, sliding her tongue right inside of his mouth, but that couldn't be right so he just stayed frozen, too caught up in the impossible moment to do anything else.
Sometime, maybe an hour or a half-dozen pounding heartbeats later, he felt a soft expulsion of air against his skin as she sighed. Her hands came up to cup his face, then her palms slid up his jawline and her fingers buried themselves in his still-damp hair. Pulling her mouth from his, she dropped featherweight kisses on his cheeks, his eyelids, his brows and the slope of his nose.
"You still taste of the rain."
The softly murmured words shattered the mesmerized dream state he had fallen into, landing him back in a world of need and confusion and sheer panic. His hands came up to catch her elbows and push her back a step, far enough that maybe he could remember how to breathe. He had no memory at all of how he got across the room, but he suddenly found himself trying to shove one arm into the sodden sleeve of his suit coat as if it would somehow protect him from the rain, reiterating some incoherent stupidity about needing to feed horses that were already fed and settled for the night.
"Please, J.D... don't go."
That quiet plea caught him before he had taken a single step toward the door, the sound of her voice shocking him back to coherent thought.
"I'm not blind, you know," Amelia continued, speaking to his back. "I know you want to stay. You want to be with me. You have almost from the beginning."
"No!" Liar. "All right, yes... But it ain't right."
"Why not?"
"'Cause you're a lady," he threw back, even though it seemed too obvious to need being put into words.
"Is that all?" For the first time since she'd confronted her father in front of the hotel, her voice had regained its bitterness. Amelia was silent for a long moment, then she asked quietly, "J.D.? Do you have a half-dollar?"
His thinking was so confused that he couldn't even speculate on what prompted that absurd question. His waistcoat hung over the back of the chair beside him. He fished around in its pockets until he found a coin, then held it up uncertainly.
While he was wondering what she wanted him to do with it, Amelia came up behind him. Taking the coin from his fingers, she tucked it daintily into the neckline of her borrowed shirt. When she saw understanding blossom in his eyes, she smiled without humor.
"Does this solve the problem?"
"No! You ain't a..." He couldn't finish the sentence.
"The people in town say I'm no better than a whore, because I couldn't bear to be a rancher's wife my whole life. Couldn't bear to stay with a man who cared nothing for me. Who only wanted me because I cooked his meals and he didn't have to pay to use me. There was a young man passing through town, and he... found me desirable. So I told him he could have me if he took me with him to Denver. Then once, a couple of years later, there was someone, and I thought he needed me so I stayed with him for a while."
Buck must be rubbing off on him after all, because that admission didn't mean a thing to him now, except that it echoed of old pain and he knew how hard it must be for her to say it to him. He remembered her anger and her stiff pride in the cemetery, when she'd thought he was thinking about... well, everything he had been thinking about, more or less nonstop ever since. "Whatever you've done to get by, it don't change who you are. And it's got nothing to do with how I've been... That is, with what I've..."
"Are you sure?" she asked, very softly.
"Of course. Look, I can't say I ain't had some thoughts in my head that I ain't proud of, but it's not 'cause I think of you as a... It's just cause I... I mean, I would never--"
She laid her fingers against his mouth to still the incoherent words, then traced the outline of his lips, the light touch an all-too-vivid reminder of the damp brush of her tongue. "Why in hell are you acting like this?" he demanded, oblivious for once to the fact that he'd been raised not to talk like that in front of a woman.
"Because I want to be with you, too. You make me feel alive and--" Her fingers brushed his face again-- "happy. I came to Four Corners expecting to be miserable, and then I met you. You're a very attractive man, J.D."
"Yeah, right--"
"You are," she retorted, bristling visibly at his dismissive tone. "You have the most beautiful eyes I've ever seen, and they laugh all the time. And there's a wealth of compassion and honor in you, even if you haven't exactly figured out that it's there yet. And if--perhaps--you tend to talk a little more than you should, it's because you're so much in love with life that you just can't contain it all... When I saw the way you looked at me, at first I was angry because I've known too many men who do see things in nothing but black and white. They think because there are things in my past I'm not proud of, that I have no honor left. No feelings."
Buck claimed he respected all women, but he was no more adverse to keeping company with proper widows and improper wives than he was with working girls. Secretly, J.D. had always seen that as a kind of hypocrisy, but looking at the pride and worry in Amelia's blue eyes, he realized that maybe it was the truth, and the smartest thing Buck knew how to do.
"I told you, it ain't like that. I mean, sometimes it is, almost, but I've been trying real hard not to--"
"I know. So have I, because it really would make things so much less complicated. But it hasn't worked out that way for either of us, has it?"
Simultaneous waves of heat and tension hit him as the full meaning of what she was saying finally sank into his overstressed brain. Mesmerized by the thought, he reached out and ran his fingers across her hair. "You want...? I mean, I thought it was just me."
Amelia turned her face into his touch, so that the softness of her cheek brushed his hand. She shook her head within the circle of his palm, her eyes never leaving his.
"It wasn't just you."
He'd been so busy trying to hide what he was going through that it had never occurred to him that she might be feeling something in return. He'd been told that properly brought-up ladies weren't interested in that sort of thing, but even he wasn't so naive that he believed *that*. It just hadn't seemed possible that this woman would be interested in him.
The heady realization opened up a whole new vista of possibilities and a whole different set of worries. With Buck, he'd blustered and lied and tried to pretend he knew all about being with a woman, but he'd blurted out the truth to Emily about midway between when she dragged him through her tent flap by his belt and when Chris's rifle shot rescued him from the embarrassing discovery that his body was even more nervous about the situation than the rest of him.
It wasn't that he hadn't had a few opportunities since. A couple of the saloon girls had made it clear that they wouldn't have minded his coins and his company. Trouble was, he could never quite get it out of his head that Buck might have put them up to it. Even if that wasn't the case, Buck kept company with most of them and would have heard all about it almost before he got his breath back. Worse yet, if things hadn't exactly worked out, the way they hadn't with Emily, Buck would've been sure to hear that, too.
He really had meant to get around the problem by taking a ride out to Wickestown--which was, of course, still going strong under new management--on his own, but there always seemed to be something happening to get in the way. And now it was just too damned late.
"Amelia... I don't exactly know..." He swallowed with difficulty. "I mean, I ain't... That is, I know what to... but..."
"Shhh."
Settling her arms around his waist, she cut off his incoherent attempt at a confession with a kiss. More than a kiss. Her mouth didn't just lie against his, she brushed it with her lips, sucked at it with tiny, delicate biting motions that set off tingling shocks along every nerve in his body. When she licked him again, more insistently this time, he took the gamble and opened his lips against hers. His chest muscles spasmed as her tongue slipped daintily into his mouth, stroked his, then slowly withdrew in unspoken invitation.
He followed by instinct, diffidently tasting the slick, sharpness of her teeth, growing bolder and more confident when Amelia sighed her approval and pressed tightly against him. As he caressed the rough sweetness of her tongue, his hands began to move over her body, keenly aware of how supple she was now. How soft. With nothing between her and his hands but a layer of well-washed and worn cotton, he could almost imagine he was touching her skin.
Every time he tried to think about what was about to happen, the thoughts scattered in every direction, so J.D. stopped trying and sank into a world where nothing existed but the heavenly bliss of kissing her and touching her. In that first, perfect moment, he couldn't imagine anything better than staying like this for hours, discovering what it truly felt like to hold a woman in his arms, to taste her mouth, to feel her hair slide over his fingers like damp silk.
The table was behind him, so he settled back against the edge of it, needing it to maintain his balance and keep him reminded that his legs did know how to support him. The tautness in his chest began to settle lower, muscles tightening in his belly then lower still. Within the rigid confinement of the dungarees, the swelling tension his groin made for as much discomfort as pleasure, and an urgent hunger for release began to build within him.
Amelia's hands left his back, slid between them and began to work loose the buttons on his shirt. When it was open, she shoved it down off his shoulders, and he found the presence of mind to release her for a moment so that she could push it down his arms. It fell away, forgotten before it landed on the table behind him. Settling against him again, she kissed the hollow of his throat, nipped the line of his jaw, then returned to his mouth for another long, thorough kiss.
Breaking away at last, Amelia dropped a rain of quick little nips and licks down his chest while she worked free the buttons of his borrowed vest. J.D.'s breath caught in a ragged gasp as she pushed the material aside and took one of his nipples into her mouth. The tip of her tongue flattened against it, then she grasped it between her teeth to worry it gently. The feeling was so exquisite that his whole body jerked in response.
Amelia's purr of laughter was a soft vibration against his skin, then the damp warmth of her mouth found his other nipple, caressed and sucked on it.
Throwing back his head, J.D. clutched the small of her back, dragging her more tightly against him, shivering as he ground himself reflexively against her. If he'd been able to think, he would have known that things were swiftly slipping out of his control, but he no longer had that much presence of mind. It was as though everything he'd felt and dreamed and desired in the past several days had come together as a throbbing need that clawed through his groin.
Amelia's hand slid down the center of his chest, her nails lightly raking the sparse down that was finally starting to sprout. Even though their bodies were pressed tightly together, she somehow managed to reach the waistband of his pants. Slipping lower still, her warm hand cupped his anguished flesh within its too-tight confinement.
That one, small touch was his undoing. J.D. didn't even manage to cry out. His breath stopped in his throat as he exploded, bucking wildly against the pressure of her palm and her hip, mortified to know what was happening... what he couldn't stop from happening.... while a whole deluge of sensation--ecstasy and discomfort, humiliation and fierce relief--coursed through him.
When it was over, he gasped in a ragged breath, staying upright only because the edge of the table was holding him there. Amelia's fingers still cupped him, and he flinched away. There wasn't even a forlorn hope that she hadn't felt the stickiness wetting his crotch, but even the binding dungarees were agony against his softening, oversensitive flesh. The light additional pressure of her hand was too much to bear.
Sandwiched between the table and her body, there was nowhere to go unless he shoved her aside, and even then, J.D. wasn't sure his legs were ready to support him. While he floundered for an escape, an apology--anything--Amelia made a soft, warm little noise that he felt through the bones of his chest, and kissed the side of his throat.
"Amelia, I'm sorry." The voice was strangled and breathless and sounded nothing at all like his own.
"What on earth for?"
It was such an absurd question, that it silenced him momentarily, and then she had his earlobe between her teeth and was worrying at it like she'd done with his nipple, acting as though nothing at all untoward had happened.
"Do you want to stop?" she whispered, still close to his ear.
That was an even more absurd question. He was so drained he was shaking, so ashamed that he wanted to crawl into a hole, but if she was going to forgive him, he definitely didn't want to stop--not when he could tell he was on the very brink of the most wonderful discovery of his life.
Amelia leaned back so she could look at him. She must have read that answer from his face, because she smiled and traced his lips with her finger.
"Good." Taking one of his hands, which had somehow ended up locked around the rough wood of the table, she twined her fingers through his and started towards the bedroom.
J.D. followed along uncertainly. Not that he was particularly superstitious or anything, but it gave him a weird, uneasy sort of feeling to know what they were about to do in Sam Johnson's bed.
"You sure you're all right with being here?" he asked, as she stopped by the bed and turned to face him.
"As long as you're with me--" she kissed him-- "it'll be fine... Touch me, J.D."
He couldn't have said which caught and held him more, the vulnerability in her eyes or the promise of her body. She was still holding his hand, and she brought it up to her breast, splaying her fingers behind his to guide him until he moved on his own. Raising his other hand, he cupping the lush fullness of her flesh within his palms. His thumbs found the hard little nubs of her nipples, and on impulse he bent and sucked at one right through the cloth.
Amelia's sigh of pleasure swept away any final qualms. He might not have a clear idea of what he was doing, but she had already shown him a few possibilities he wanted to explore. J.D. figured instinct would help him along to the rest. Laughing softly, he brushed his thumb across her other nipple, and circled her waist with his free hand, holding her against him while he sucked and licked at her breast until his mouth left a dark, wet stain on the faded fabric.
The interest reawakening in his body urged him on. He wanted to touch every part of her, discover every curve, every muscle, every inch of skin. He definitely wanted skin, so he set to work unbuttoning her shirt, following the movements of his hands with his mouth, tasting each piece of newly exposed skin as she had done with him.
When the last button was gone, and the shirt fell open, Amelia let it drop from her shoulders. The storm outside was finally playing itself out, but it had taken the afternoon with it. The last fading twilight seeped through the window to illuminate her, but she didn't seem embarrassed to stand there before his eyes, bare to the waist.
"There are matches in the drawer," Amelia said a moment later, and that made him realize that he'd frozen again, just looking at her. She pointed to the low chest-of-drawers beside the bed, which held the wash basin and a hurricane lamp.
"You, um... want me to light the lamp?"
She tilted her head to the side. "Unless you'd rather not?" "Ain't that. I just thought..."
It did seem like a lamp would be a bit counterproductive to what was going on here. But when he thought about it a bit more, he decided that in a strange room, with only a half idea of what he was doing, darkness was apt to be more of a hindrance to him than modesty.
"Never mind."
He found the matches, struck one and touched it to the wick of the lamp. As the golden light flared up, he turned to find that the rest of Amelia's clothes now lay in a heap beside her feet.
J.D. had never before seen a naked woman. Emily hadn't removed even half her clothes before outside events interrupted them, and he hadn't really gotten the notion that she was planning to, either. He'd seen some of those lewd photographs, of course, the kind they imported from Paris. In their own way they'd been pretty inspiring, but they were nothing compared to a real live, flesh-and-blood woman, so close he could touch her at will, taste her, hear her laughter and feel the warmth of her breath.
Almost reverently, he cupped her breasts again, weighing them in his hands. He shot a quick glance at Amelia's face, unconsciously seeking permission for an act which seemed far more intimate with no cloth between them, then took one tiny, hard nipple back into his mouth while his thumb found the other. This time he could taste the salty tang of her skin.
Amelia's soft moan, and the ripple of tension that shivered down her body, was enough to start him hardening again. After all that had already happened, it made no sense to be shy, but as he straightened away from her to shrug free of his unbuttoned vest and push it down to his waist, he found himself blushing, wishing they were back in the darkness.
No, he decided immediately. He was glad they weren't in the dark, because then he wouldn't be able to see her.
J.D. had kind of frozen again, with his hands on the buttons of his dungarees. With a smile and a kiss, Amelia unbuttoned them for him, then pushed them and his drawers down over his hips. He gasped in relief when he sprung free of the imprisoning cloth, then gasped again and shuddered as she took his shaft in her hand. She couldn't span his full girth, but she clasped as much of him as she could, her fingers gliding along him from base to partly retracted foreskin and back again.
"Don't!"
It was torture to push her hand away, but he didn't want to disgrace himself again, and he was already too excited to risk that much direct stimulation. This time he was going to do everything right.
If only he had a clearer idea of exactly what that meant. Oh, sure, he knew the basic parts of it. For one thing, he'd worked around horses his whole life, and for another, when Buck was really drunk his stories could get pretty damn specific. But the two things together didn't exactly make for an education. Amelia took a dainty step backwards, pushed the quilt aside, and settled down on the sheet, sitting with her feet curled beneath her and one hand on the wrought-iron of the headboard to keep her balance. The shivery little flame of the lamp played over her skin, burnishing the dark points of her nipples and the satiny triangle of hair where her legs came together. He felt amazingly sinful, standing there, looking at her so exposed for his eyes. It made him feel hot all over, short of breath, so aroused that he feared he might come again, right where he stood. Amelia slid up onto her knees, balancing carefully on the mattress and opened her arms.
"It's easier if you come over here." Her voice was merry with laughter, but there was a roughened edge to it now, something he'd never heard before that seemed to echo his own needs.
J.D. came into her arms, and together they tumbled flat onto the mattress. The sheets smelled fresh and clean. A little corner of his mind wondered if she'd made up the bed while he was caring for the horses, and if she had, had she done it because she knew they were sleeping out here tonight, or because she'd already decided to share it with him?
The question brought him into the whole realm of how women thought, and that was definitely a problem for another time. He was more than fully occupied with discovering how they felt... lush breasts that flattened against his chest or formed a soft weight in his hands... sleek muscles sheathed within silken skin... hidden treasures of warmth and wetness... salt-sweet skin.
By the time Amelia settled on her back and drew him on top of her, he was losing it again, but this time he knew it was right. She took him in her hand again to guide him, and he thought the stroking pressure of her fingers as she smoothed back his foreskin must be the most marvelous feeling he'd ever experienced--until he sank into her wet heat and felt it grasp him.
Amelia's legs came up around his hips, her skin cool against the feverish warmth of his. Driven by pure instinct, his body began to move of its own accord while dueling needs raged through him: the hunger to hang onto this exquisite sensation for as long as he could warring with the urge to drain himself into her in ecstatic release.
When he knew he couldn't hang on for another second, J.D. grabbed a fistful of the sheet to either side of her body, clinging to them for dear life while he shuddered and cried out and finished. He barely managed enough presence of mind to shift to the side before his arms gave out and he collapsed.
For a couple of minutes, he lay there, face down on the bed, dragging breath into his lungs in ragged pants. When he finally tried to blink open his eyes, a trickle of sweat promptly blinded him, so he rubbed it away against the sheet.
Amelia was watching him, her face inches from his own, her lips curved slightly in a smile. As soon as he lifted his head, a couple of the unruly half-bangs that straggled around his forehead fell forward into his eyes. Amelia snagged one and tucked it neatly behind his ear, then twined the second around and around her finger, as though she was trying to coax it into forming a ringlet. Not wanting to discover if she'd succeed, J.D. tossed his head, freeing the hank of hair and getting it out of his way.
"Been meaning to get a haircut," he informed her, though it didn't exactly seem to be an important thing to talk around right now.
"I like it. Maybe you should grow it long, like Kit Carson, or Wild Bill."
J.D. laughed quietly. "Better not introduce you to Vin."
"Let me see... Vin is the bounty hunter, correct?"
"Used to be one."
"Why shouldn't you introduce me to him?"
"He's got real long hair. Probably ain't never had a haircut in his whole life."
Settling back down again, with his cheek propped up on one arm so he could look at her, he ran his fingers from the tiny hollow at the base of her throat through the deep cleft between her breasts. When he reached the small mound of her stomach, he splayed his fingers wide and let his hand rest there, feeling the rise and fall of her breathing.
"This is even harder'n it was at dinner."
"I beg your pardon?"
"That night we had dinner together, I couldn't for the life of me figure out what I was supposed to talk about--"
"You did just fine, as I recall."
His lips twitched. "Drank too much wine and ran off at the mouth is what you mean. Always seem to be running off at the mouth, about the wrong things at the wrong time, but... right now, I don't know what I'm supposed to say."
"Well, you might say that you love me, but it would be a lie and so we're better off without it." She said it lightly, honest merriment dancing in her eyes.
"You might say that now that we're lovers, we must marry--but that would be dreadfully inconvenient, wouldn't it? What with you being sheriff, and me having every intention of leaving town in a few days. So--" She shifted until she was on her side, facing him, and stretched forward to give him a kiss that was deep and hungry, and gone again before he could move to embrace her. "So, why not just say you enjoy my company? Say you're glad to be here with me, for this little while."
"Can't say as how I've ever been more glad of anything in my whole life."
She laughed gaily at the declaration, and J.D. guessed it would seem like an exaggeration when he thought about it with a clear head later, but right now he meant it sincerely.
Catching up the discarded quilts, Amelia pulled them up over both of them. With the sweat beginning to cool on his body, J.D. was glad of the warmth. The temperature outside was dropping, as it always did as soon as the sun was gone, and the fire in the next room must have burned down to nearly nothing.
"Why don't you turn out the light?"
Obediently, he leaned out over the edge of the bed, cupped his hand around the chimney of the hurricane lamp, and blew it out. As he settled back, he was sharply aware of the unfamiliar feel of the cotton sheets against his skin. He'd never slept naked in his entire life.
He was kind of half-pondering the notion of slipping out of bed to put something on, but Amelia shifted until she was fitted tightly against his side, one of her legs folding across his thighs. Wetness and soft hair pressed against the bone of his hip, banishing any idea at all of moving and sparking a twinge of regret that he was so damned tired.
J.D.'s arm was trapped between them. He slid it carefully free and settled it around Amelia's back, completing the embrace. He liked the feel of holding her like that, having her warmth sinking into his skin. Tucking his nose into her hair, he breathed in a faint fragrance of perfumed soap which managed to cling there in spite of everything. The hair tickled a bit, especially when he inhaled, but he just plain enjoyed it too much to move away.
He fell asleep within moments.
