Chapter 8

"For Christ's sake!" Wade said explosively. 'Wow what's the matter?"

"I ... oh, I'm sorry, Wade. I don't know what's the matter with me. Honest, I don't. But when you started to touch me just then I thought of Claire and ... oh!"

Wade winced and stepped back from her.

"You see?" she said in a stricken voice. "I don't know what's come over me ... I am sorry, darling." She brushed the tips of her fingers lightly across his cheek, then became brisk. "Well, if you insist on helping, I'll wash, you dry. Okay?"

He relinquished the apron which she tied around her waist again. His face felt as stiff and cold as a mask out of glacial ice. But Lisa chose to ignore it. She stacked the dishes in the sink, gave him a dish towel, and he dried the dishes she handed him, his movements wooden. They finished quickly, neither speaking during the chore. Then Wade hung up the dish towel and said, stiffly, "Well ... I guess I'd better be going."

He was halfway to the door when her voice stopped him. "Wade?"

He looked back over his shoulder. Her face had undergone a change. It was tender, luminous; her lips seemed swollen, bee-stung. She beckoned. "Come here to me, darling."

He went to her quickly, his pulse accelerating. This time she came into his arms without reservations. She stood on tiptoe to meet his mouth. They kissed so fiercely their teeth clashed together painfully. He filled his hands with the firm, saucy outcurve of her buttocks. She shifted, adjusted, her mouth never leaving his, until the curves and hollows of her body fitted against his as though both bodies had been precision-tooled to mesh.

At the first touch of his lips a soft, sighing sound escaped her and he knew instinctively that she was his to do with as he wished. This thought plus the feel of her in his arms sent sparks of sensation along his nerve ends like the racing of a burning fuse. Yet he held himself in check, fighting for a semblance of control. It was early in their relationship yet, very early. If he pushed too fast and too far, he might drive her away from him forever.

As though scanning his thoughts, she took her mouth from his to say throatily, "Let's move into the bedroom, darling. When we're married, I'll neck with you in the kitchen whenever you wish. After the dishes are done, of course. But I do think the bedroom's better the first time."

"You mean, in broad daylight?" he asked and laughed nervously.

"Why not?" She chuckled impishly. "Is there a law that says it has to be dark?"

"None that I know of." He took her hand and led her from the kitchen, through the living room and down the hall, thinking he would never understand women. A few minutes ago she had been deathly afraid of him. And now. ... Well, now was now! To hell with a few minutes ago!

There were two bedrooms in the apartment. He tensed as they reached the closed door to what had been Claire's bedroom. He hoped Lisa wouldn't steer him in there. But, as his step slowed, she tugged at his hand and led him down the hall to the second bedroom. Heavy drapes were drawn across the windows and the room was dark as a cave.

"You see, darling, it's dark, anyway. Unless you'd rather have a light on?"

He remembered the past few nights with Janis and straining passion sated in darkness; he had had enough of the dark. He said, "No, turn on a light. I want to see you."

"Me, too!" Her breath caught. "Oh, yes, me, too!"

She flicked a switch, and Wade blinked in the sudden dazzle of light. There were none of the frills of Claire's bedroom. The room was almost stark in its simplicity; he was sure that was Lisa's doing. And the bed was normal, not queen size.

He turned to Lisa just as she shucked the sweater over her head. She tossed it aside and bent both arms behind her back to get at the bra strap. The black bra confined firm, rather small breasts and was the only garment above her waist. Her flesh had once been a golden tan but was now fading out. When her breasts were freed, a narrow strip of white passed all the way around her.

Lisa saw the direction of his glance and she flushed slightly. "There's a pond on the ranch where I swim almost every day when the weather's nice. But it's close to the ranch house and I have to wear a suit." She smiled saucily, her brief shyness gone. "Or else give the hands a treat."

Wade placed a finger under her chin and tilted her face up. Her lips parted in invitation and he crushed his mouth to hers, probing deep with his tongue. She responded fully to him, reaching, seeking, demanding. He explored her mouth with his tongue, savoring the heated-honey sweetness.

His hands moved over her body, his fingers seeking the touch buds of her passion with a lover's Braille. But the rest of her clothes inhibited him. He tugged impatiently at the elastic band of the capris. He heard something snap. Lisa struggled free of his arms. "Wait, darling. Let me."

As she stepped back, the back of her hand inadvertently brushed across his loins. She shuddered visibly, her head falling back, her tousled hair falling attractively toward her shoulders. "Wade ... darling Wade, you make me feel like an utter wanton!"

She peeled off the capris, stepped out of peach-colored panties, then posed proudly for his inspection. Her pert breasts were firm, the nipples like brown thimbles with the faintest tint of rose. Her body flowed in smooth lines from sloping shoulders to long, tapering thighs. Her hips were broad for such a small woman, the brown triangle at her loins the symbol of her womanhood. Although she stood perfectly still under his gaze, there seemed to be a slight, suggestive roll to her hips.

His passion vaulted and he started across the room toward her, almost tripping over his own feet in his haste. He ripped and tore at his clothes, and by the time he reached her he was down to his trousers and shorts. When at last he stood fully revealed to her, a low moan came from Lisa and she swayed toward him. He caught her. Savagely he crushed her lissome body against his. The points where their bodies made contact seared him like licking flames.

"Wade! Darling, darling!"

He dug his fingers into her yielding buttocks, bending her far back so he could find one of the tumescent nipples with his mouth. The scent of her filled his nostrils as he lifted her off the floor, molding the soft flesh to his muscular leanness.

All the woman he had ever known, all the female bodies he had ever held in his arms, faded from memory as he picked her up and carried her to the bed. He placed her gently on it and gazed down at her. Her heavy-lidded eyes spoke an urgent invitation, as did her up-thrust breasts and trembling thighs.

He had to ask it. "Not afraid of me now?"

"Not afraid of you, no, darling." Then she laughed. "I'd say you could be dangerous in your condition. But I'm not what you would call afraid." She raised her arms to him, her lips parted, hips already in the motion of erotic anticipation.

Love rose up in Wade's throat as he knelt beside the bed and reached hungrily for the delectable body. He could feel the urgent heat of her as he placed his cheek on the smoothness of her belly and circled his tongue in the dark coil of her navel.

"Darling!" She buried her fingers deep in his hair, pressed his face firmly to her quivering flesh. "Oh, yes! Kiss!"

Tenderly, almost reverently, he trailed kisses from her navel to her left breast. There he mouthed the turgid nipple, worried it with lips, teeth and tongue. As he went back and forth from one nipple to the other, his desire spiraled higher and higher. He longed to take her then and there, drive himself to her again and again until he was utterly exhausted. With any other woman he knew he would have, but now, his lust was tempered by love. She wasn't a tramp, a pickup made in the cheap bars fringing rodeo grounds. She wasn't even a Janis ... wasn't even?

With a moan he rose up higher to reach her mouth. Lisa locked her hands behind his head and they kissed until red dots danced before Wade's eyes as he fought for breath.

Lisa broke the kiss and whispered hoarsely in his ear, "Now, Wade? Now, darling?"

It was time. He got upon the bed, moved around on his knees before her. She reached out, found him, and guided him. He plunged and she welcomed him, velvet thighs instantly clamping his hips and corralling his ferocity, and he was encased in ecstasy beyond imagining.

Lisa clung to him with every muscle at her command. Wildly she thrashed beneath him, lifting him clear of the bed repeatedly, meeting his onslaught with a vigor to match his own. Wade worked his hands under her, sank his fingers in the pulsing flesh, and held her against him as his passion raced out of control. "Wade!" His name burst from her throat in a scream, then she clamped her teeth onto his shoulder.

It grew wilder and wilder but ever more wonderful as the microseconds wheeled by. He had forgotten how marvelous it could be with a woman like this, with a woman he loved. With Janis, it was lust, nothing more, a frantic coupling of animals. Love made all the difference. They were one in passion, one in ecstasy. For the sensation was there as well, gathering in him now, a whirling vortex of sensation about to draw him down and down, ever down....

Lisa screamed, "Now, my darling! Now! I'm ... there! Don't wait!"

He let himself go. The vortex pulled him down, spun him into mindlessness, then tossed him high in a starburst of blazing rapture. A symphony of the planets thundered in his ears as he clung desperately to her writhing body.

"Oh! Ah!" Her head twisted back and forth on the pillow as she arched against him and a convulsive spasm ripped through her. Her nails raked the straining muscles of his back. "Wade, I love you ... love you ... love you ... love...."

He held her tightly as the final ripple of release shook her. Then his breath exploded with a great groan and he collapsed in exhaustion on her lax body. He placed his head on her breasts, his ear over her heart, and listened to its mighty thunder.

When he finally rolled off to stretch out beside her, Lisa feathered his lips with moist fingers. "I do love you, darling. I don't know how it happened so sudden, so fast, but it did. And I'm glad!"

"Amen to that," he said with heaving breath.

"You know now I'm not a virgin. Do you mind awfully much?"

He did mind, at least a little. He supposed all men wanted the woman they loved to be a virgin. He said stoutly, "Why should I mind? I'm not a virgin."

"But it's different with men." She tangled her fingers in the hairs on his chest and laughed softly. "I could have told you it happened riding a horse. It happens that way with many women, you know. And I do ride a lot of horses!" Then her voice grew solemn. "But it didn't happen that way. I was eighteen when I lost my virginity. I lost it to a randy cowhand who smelled of horse sweat ... it was messy and unpleasant. So naturally I had to try again to see what the shouting was all about. And a couple of more times." Her words spilled out in a rush, as though something compelled her to confess. "But none were so wonderful as ... this. How I wish I'd waited!" He felt a warm tear drop on his chest. "I'm sorry I didn't wait, darling!"

"Why is it women have to talk about the other men they've known?" he said gruffly. "I couldn't be less interested."

"Oh, but the way I understand it, it's the other way around!" She raised up until her face hovered over his. And, as suddenly as she had shed a tear, she was laughing. "Men are always bragging about their conquests!"

"You haven't heard me, have you?"

"No...." She peered at him shrewdly. "But I have a hunch there haven't been that many women with you."

He felt color mount to his face.

"You're blushing!" She chortled. Then she aimed a kiss at his mouth and missed, her lips skidding across his cheek. "I'm sorry, darling, I shouldn't tease. You're sweet and I love you for it."

To cover his confusion, he groped around on the floor for his trousers and dug out a pack of cigarettes.

"Light me one, darling. Just like they do in the movies," she remarked romantically.

He lit two cigarettes and gave her one. He leaned back against the headboard and inhaled deeply. For the first time he had a direct look at the wall opposite the bed. And on the wall was a framed sketch done in pen and ink. It was of Lisa, a younger Lisa, a caricature of her as a cowgirl, with chaps, sixguns, et cetera. Memory jabbed at him, and a pulse began to pound in his forehead. He gestured toward the sketch with his cigarette. "Your sister did that sketch of you, didn't she?"

"Oh, yes! I didn't tell you that about her, did I? Claire was quite talented in that direction, even as a girl. Before she decided to become a movie star, she wanted to be an artist. She probably could have, too. I think she had the talent. She still played around with sketching things like that one, mostly when she was drinking."

"That just might do it," he muttered. "If it's still there."

"What might do what, darling, if it's still there?"

"There's something that slipped my mind when I told you about my day with Claire." He told her about the sketch Claire had drawn in lipstick on the mirror in the western saloon. "It might not do anything toward solving her murder but it would certainly prove to my satisfaction that I was with her that day, that it isn't something I read about and fastened onto with a sick mind."

Lisa came up on her knees, bare breasts bobbing. She said excitedly, "You think it might still be there?"

"It just might be. Claire said sometimes those sets aren't used for months, even years, and nobody comes near them in the meantime. I'm sure it hadn't been used for a long time when we were there. There was dust over everything like a heavy fall of snow."

She beat her hands together. "Then let's go!"

"Whoa now! Who said you're going."

"I say. From now on, cowhand, where you go, I go!"

"That could be downright embarrassing at times," he said dryly. "Besides ... if I remember correctly, Claire didn't sign the sketch . ... "

"That doesn't matter," she broke in impatiently. "I'd recognize her work anywhere."

He had to grin. "Meaning that I might not know for sure unless you're along?"

"Right! You're sharp, darling." Again she beat her hands together. "That's what I said to myself when I first saw you ... I said to myself, 'This is one sharp cowhand'. "

"Sure, I am! The sharpest," he said, suddenly glum. He stared ahead at nothing for a moment, then shook his head in anger at himself. "Be all that as it may be, we'll have to wait. I can just see us trying to get past the guards at the gate. We'll have to wait until after dark, after they're closed down for the night and sneak in somehow."

"Oh." She slumped, dejected. "And meanwhile?"

"Well...." He arched an eyebrow at her. "Do you have any suggestions?"

"Any suggestions? Hey...! " She brightened. "Do I ever!"

"Such as?"

"Such as ... such as this, cowhand!"

With a yelp she launched herself at him and Wade closed his mind to all thought and let his senses take charge of his body.