Only 04 - Only Love

and heat licked over him in sultry caress.
    “That,” Whip said huskily, “is the purest kind of honey.”
    Shannon looked down and saw Whip’s hand moving inside her loose trousers, between her legs, touching her as she had never been touched.
    “I shouldn’t—let you.”
    “We’re just playing, honey girl. Men and women do this all the time. It’s a way of finding out if you want to play for real.”
    Slick fingertips circled the knot Whip had drawn from Shannon’s softness. Instantly she stiffened and shuddered and cried out with surprise.
    “Am I hurting you?” Whip asked.
    “No,” she said, her voice ragged. “It feels—strange.”
    “Strange bad or strange good?”
    As Whip asked, he plucked and felt the hot rush of Shannon’s response spilling over his hand.
    “Your body says that it feels good,” he said, biting her neck. “Damned good.”
    Shannon’s only answer was a whimper and a jerk of her hips with each deft motion of his hand. Pressure coiled and coiled and coiled, driving her toward something she had never known.
    “Whip! I can’t—stop! Stop! I’m scared!”
    “It’s all right, honey girl. You’re nearly there. Lie back against me and let me take you the rest of the way.”
    Shannon tried to answer, but Whip was caressing the lush, soft flesh between her legs. She whimpered as pleasure clenched tightly, summoned by his fingers and the pressure of his teeth at the nape of her neck. Helplessly her hips rocked and lifted, seeking something she couldn’t name.
    Whip knew what Shannon sought. He circled the knot of her passion, caressing her with fingers slick from her wild response. He heard her whimpers come more quickly, felt the tension drawing her body until it was rigid, shaking.
    Shannon’s breath fragmented over Whip’s name and she convulsed with a pleasure that was beyond anything she had eve imagined. Helpless in the grip of ecstasy, she called his name again and again.
    It took an act of will for Whip to stop caressing the honey and silk between Shannon’s legs. He wanted to sheathe himself in the fire of her body, to feel her softness caress him with every sweet surge of her release.
    And then he wanted to spend himself in her fire until he couldn’t remember what it was like to go hungry, aching with each breath, each heartbeat.
    Shannon made a broken sound and moved against his hand. Heat pulsed between their skin.The air beneath the tarpaulin was steamy, mysterious, exciting beyond anything Whip had ever known.
    “You’re everything your walk hinted you were,” he said roughly. “Honey and fire.”
    Whip set his jaw against the temptation offered by the girl lying so seductively between his legs, her body open to his hand. Slowly, feeling as though he were tearing off his own skin, he forced himself to release the sultry, honeyed flesh.
    He wasn’t nearly so slow about getting out from under the steamy intimacy of the tarpaulin. A few swift, savage motions of his hands tucked the tarpaulin around Shannon, protecting her from the violent weather.
    “Stay here until the storm’s over,” Whip said.
    “What about you?” asked a muffled voice.
    “I’m hot enough to burn ice.”
    Hail beat on Whip’s body as he went to check on the horses. Grimly he hoped it would put out the fire.
    It didn’t.

10
    “A NY better luck?” Shannon asked, looking up from the campfire.
    “Same as yesterday,” Whip said, bending to scratch Prettyface’s ears.
    Afraid that Whip would see her fear, Shannon looked away from him to Grizzly Meadow where the two horses and the mule were grazing, their tails lazily swatting flies. Golden, slanting light spilled over the land, infusing it with the first rush of true summer heat.
    Six days.
    For six days Whip had gone up to the Rifle Sight claim while she stayed in the camp. For six days he had hammered with pickax and determination on the stone shoulder of the mountain.
    For six days all Whip had found was the sweat dripping down his nose.
    “Tomorrow,” Shannon said. “It will be better tomorrow. Or the day after.”
    Whip didn’t say anything. He simply slid his big hand under Prettyface’s chin and rubbed until the dog’s eyes glazed over with pleasure.
    When Shannon turned back to Whip, she saw the dark smudges beneath his eyes and the trails perspirationhad made through the rock dust coating his entire body. Each afternoon she washed in a basin and rinsed in the stream before he came back. Then she heated more