She stayed where she was, tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth and feet rooted solidly to the ground-not because of fear, although he’d never looked more fierce, emerging from the water in all his manly splendor, like some ancient river god, with his hair slicked back and plastered to his neck and shoulders like seaweed, exotic features etched in bold relief by sunlight and deep shadows. She stood motionless because she had lost faith in the capability of her legs to support her body, and silent because of her tongue’s inability to form words. She kept her eyes glued to his unsmiling face and was relieved beyond all reason when she felt his hands lightly touch her shoulders.

The air had become molten, too thick and heavy to be drawn into something as frail as lungs. And her heart, surely it would do itself an injury, banging so violently against the confines of her chest!

Somehow she held herself erect, not reaching for him, understanding that it wasn’t yet the time for touching, even though her body felt his magnetism like a planet feels the pull of the sun. She held herself still, proud that her trembling was only inside, as he slowly drew her T-shirt over her head and dropped it on the rocks beside her. The air felt oven-hot on her skin, but at its touch her nipples drew hard and tight.

Dropping to one knee, he drew off her boots, then her jeans, her underpants, her socks, and when she was as naked as he, rose in one swift fluid motion and took her hands. Smoldering eyes and swelling manhood betrayed the passion raging inside him, but his hands were gentle and cool as he led her, moving backward step by step, into the pool.

The water felt like ice to her heated body, but she didn’t gasp or shiver or cringe. She’d already sensed that there was something more spiritual than sensual about what was happening between them, and she would have stopped her own breath rather than disappoint him. Now, with the water’s cold scalpel slicing at her skin, stripping away the dust and sweat, the tiredness and anger and fear, she thought she understood the symbolism in that simple ritual of cleansing.

For herself, she felt as if an old skin had been scoured from her body, leaving her a shiny new one, pure and unscarred, vulnerable and untouched. Might it be possible- it seemed as though it could be-for them to cast off at the same time the trappings and encumbrances of their too-divergent worlds and become, at least for a time, just two human beings, stripped to their most elemental state: male and female-Man and Woman? And to come together as such, fresh and clean and new.

What his thoughts and purpose were she could only wonder, because he spoke not a word to her as he guided her under the falling water. Maybe she should have wondered, as well, why she went with him so trustingly-but she didn’t. Nor did she think it strange any longer that she should trust so implicitly the same man who had kidnapped and held her prisoner; it seemed to go with her new skin, that childlike sense of innocence.

She stood quiescent and utterly still beneath the water, with eyes closed and the drumming of the cascade drowning all senses, save that of touch. Oh, yes, touch. She felt the cold glide of water and Bronco’s hands. So gently, so surely, they touched her, pouring pure clean water over her, beginning with the top of her head and flowing downward over brow and temples, eyelids, cheeks, nose and lips. She felt them glissade along her jaw, slide on under and down her neck and throat, across her chest to her breasts, and smooth the water around them so sweetly that even though her nipples drew tight and hard as diamonds and her skin seemed showered with goose bumps, she didn’t shiver. She felt his hands skim the ticklish sides of her ribs and underarms, stroke down her arms, down, down to the very tips of her fingers, then back up again to the rounds of her shoulders, flatten across her back and briefly cup the nape of her neck before plunging down the long sensitive curve of her spine.

Beneath the surface of the water now, she felt his hands, felt one slide between her buttocks, the other across her belly and deep between her thighs. Fingers introduced cool pure water into all her body’s secret places-so subtly, so gently, she neither gasped nor moaned, but only melted.

“Open your eyes-look at me.” The command was harsh and guttural, and carried to her ears even above the drum and splash of the waterfall. Dumbstruck, she obeyed, though desire coiled and writhed in her belly and she couldn’t feel her legs at all.

She saw his face through a rainbow shimmer-a warrior’s face, fierce and dark with its angry slash of brows and bright obsidian eyes. And she wondered how it was that the same man could have a face so fierce and hands so gentle. Then his features grew blurry, and she felt his hands on the sides of her neck just below her ears, and his thumbs framing her face, holding it upturned and still. Her world darkened. Her eyes closed. And she fell, trembling at last, into his kiss…

Chapter 12

Bronco didn’t carry her back to the blanket on the pine-cushioned rock shelf at the edge of the pool. This woman was not and would never be his to conquer. He was as much in awe of her as he’d ever been of any human being, and to do her honor it seemed important to him that they come to this together, walking side by side, as equals.

He stepped before her onto the blanket and knelt down, still holding her hand. Then, gazing up into her shimmering eyes, he drew her slowly toward him. When she was astride his thighs, he guided her hand to his shoulder and left it there while he reached for her and urged her closer still. He touched his lips to the taut coolness of her stomach, and when her skin shivered beneath them like the hide of a nervous mare, he felt the hot surge of arousal deep in his own belly. Suppressing it, he gently parted the damp curls at her center and kissed her there, kissed her long and deeply, until her knees buckled. Then, with tender laughter he eased her down onto the blanket.

He held her as he’d once dreamed of holding her, with the desert heat spread over them like a blanket and thunder grumbling in the distance, and her body in perfect harmony with his. He held her and felt her chilled body grow warm and pliant, like fine leather in the sun. And he pleasured her with his hands and fingers, mouth and tongue, in all the ways he knew, until she sobbed like a child in his arms.

It was only then that he realized, to both his shock and amusement, that she was furious with him.

“Why did you…how can you do that?” she sobbed, gasping and hiccuping as she struggled in his embrace. “I want to…I want you to…I want you inside-”

But he stopped her there, smothering her sob and his own frustration and calming them both with his deep and drugging kiss. When she was limp and unresisting once more, he pulled himself away from her, and with his hands framing her face, gazed deeply into her eyes. “Can’t do that, darlin’,” he murmured huskily, though there was an ache in his loins and a building pressure behind his eyes…a fire in his belly, a thirst he couldn’t quench. “Wish I could. Sorry.”

After about two beats he saw her eyes brighten with understanding. And then her mouth popped open, and he knew-dammit, he knew-she was going to fight him on it. And because fighting her on any subject wasn’t what he wanted to do just then, he gave a chuckle to mask his pain and with his lips close to her ear, whispered, “As good as my hands and mouth felt to you-that’s how good yours’ll feel to me.” He watched her eyes widen, darken, and begin to glow as he took her hand and guided it to his aching loins.

He didn’t say anything more but just left it to a groan to convince her of the truth of what he’d told her.


It was only much later, when they lay entwined in the heat of the waning afternoon, drowsy and utterly drained, that Lauren felt her doubts return. They came into her con sciousness little by little, in a cowardly shamefaced way, like jackals slinking in the shadows at the edges of the campfire light.

The first stirrings of unease came, ironically, in the midst of pleasure as she was basking in the joy of discovery, sliding her hand with deceptive idleness over the smooth planes of Bronco’s body. His body was new to her; she wanted to know every inch of it, learn every nook and cranny, memorize every scar and flaw. Though while scars he had, in fascinating abundance, she had yet to find a flaw.

His skin was so smooth. The uniformity of its color and texture fascinated her. Her own pale hide abounded in freckles, spots and moles, irregularities of every kind and description, and seemed susceptible to every environmental influence known to man. Bronco’s skin, on the other hand, had the satiny and impervious feel of polished wood. She reveled in letting her hand glide across the undulations of his torso and the unyielding ridges of his chest, marveling at how smooth it was, almost devoid of hair. His face, too-his Native American genes were definitely dominant in that regard.

And that was when she felt it, those faint but unmistakable stirrings of unease. Something about that particular fact bothered her, but she couldn’t think what it was. It reminded her, though, of all the other times she’d felt that same puzzling uncertainty, without being able to pinpoint a reason for it. Just…something. Some little inconsistency she could never quite put her finger on. She remembered that only a day or two ago she’d been raging in silent fury about the duplicity of this man, certain he was the world’s most accomplished liar and never ever to be trusted.

And yet she did trust him, didn’t she? She certainly had trusted him, even to the point, only a short while ago, of being ready to throw aside all caution and common sense. Her hand stilled; her stomach churned. For the first time in days the question burned in her mind: What’s wrong with me?

Bronco’s arms tightened around her reflexively, then relaxed as she pushed herself up on one elbow in order to look into his face. His face. A warrior’s face-fierce, savage, hard. And yet, gazing down upon its exotic planes and sharply honed lines, she felt the bottom drop out of her stomach, and the parts of her body that still throbbed and tingled with the memory of his touch begin to swell in eager anticipation all over again.

Who are you? Johnny Bronco or John Bracco? Which one, of all the men you’ve shown me, is the real you?

“Something botherin’ you, Laurie Brown?” His voice was a warm growl, like the sleepy purr of a big cat.

She gave her head a small hard shake of denial that failed to cancel out her troubled frown. “I’ve always considered myself an intelligent person,” she said in a low voice, which tightened with embarrassment as she continued. “And fairly savvy, too. I’m not without experience. I know what’s what.”

Bronco’s eyes smiled back at her, black and gleaming as always, but soft now, like those of a healthy animal. “I’m sure you do.”

She caught a breath in a reflexive jerk of protest. “But I was ready to make love with you. Without protection. I wanted to. I would have.” What’s wrong with me?

“I wanted to, too,” he said gently, his fingers toying with the ends of her hair. “You don’t know how badly.”

“But you didn’t.”

He shook his head, and the softness left his eyes as he captured her hand and held it still against his chest. “I wouldn’t do that to you.”

Inexplicable pain filled her, restricting her breathing. Trying to make light of it, she gave a high false tinkle of laughter. “Would it have been such a terrible thing?”

For a long time his eyes held hers, once more hard as obsidian and bright with facets that might have been anger…or pain. Beneath her hand his heart beat hard and fast and out of sync with her own. At last he said in a flat expressionless voice, “Maybe not terrible. I’ve got as much faith in your good health as I do my own. But…awkward for sure.” She felt his body shift and tighten, as if he’d physically hardened himself against her, though his voice remained quiet, almost gentle. “Lady, you are the president’s daughter-or going to be. I’m not about to return you to your loved ones pregnant.”

She could only stare at him; her face and throat felt swollen. Dimly she realized that his fingers were stroking the back of her hand, rubbing the third finger, the place where a ring would be. An engagement ring.

She felt the bump of his ironic laugh. “Can’t you see the headline? It’d read like a damn tabloid: President’s daughter bears half-breed Apache kidnapper’s child! No thanks.”