Only 05 - Autumn Lover

he said simply. “I didn’t mean to be rough.”
    The next time Hunter stroked her hair, Elyssa forced herself not to acknowledge it in any way. Yet she couldn’t prevent the tremors that lashed through her body, her nerves stretched to the point of breaking.
    “You were smaller than I expected,” Hunter said in a low voice. “It had been a long time for me and you were ready and I wanted you like hell on fire.”
    Elyssa said nothing, did nothing. She simply lay and shivered beneath Hunter’s gentle, unwanted touch.
    The stark trembling of Elyssa’s body was salt rubbed into the fresh wound of Hunter’s self-esteem.
    “Take it easy,” he murmured. “I’ll be gentle as sunlight with you from now on. Next time you’ll enjoy it more. There’s so much passion in you, Sassy girl. In that, at least, we’re well matched.”
    Sassy .
    The hated nickname destroyed Elyssa’s self-control. With an inarticulate cry she struck out at Hunter like the cornered animal she was. Fingers hooked like claws reached for his face.
    Reflexively Hunter caught her wrists.
    “Take it easy, Sassy. Aren’t you listening? I said I’ll never hurt you again.”
    “I hate you,” Elyssa said in a low, savage voice. “Get out before I scream down the house.”
    “For God’s sake, settle down and stop acting like an outraged virgin.”
    “Why shouldn’t I? It’s what I am! Or rather, was .”
    “What are you talking about? My wife never bled, not even the first time.”
    “Fancy man,” Elyssa snarled, “I’ll bet this ranch that you weren’t anywhere near your wife her first time!”
    Realization swept through Hunter, staggering him.
    It had been a virgin’s pain, not a flirt’s practiced passion, that had caused Elyssa to stiffen and thrash harshly beneath him.
    And he had held his hand over her mouth the whole time.
    “Sweet Jesus,” Hunter whispered, appalled. “Why didn’t you stop me?”
    “I tried!”
    Rage swept through him at the implications of what Elyssa was saying.
    “Damn you, Sassy,” he said in a low, dangerous voice, “I didn’t rape you and you know it! You were with me every step of the way, right up to the instant I—”
    Hunter’s words cut off as he realized where they were leading. Elyssa had been with him right up to the instant he ripped through her maidenhead.
    For a time Hunter’s searing blasphemies hung in the air like the acrid smoke from Elyssa’s ruined night-clothes. She listened to his words and bared her teeth in feral response, coldly gratified to know that in this, at least, she had finally reached through Hunter’s barriers.
    Hunter saw Elyssa’s travesty of a smile and knew that her rage was as deep as his own.
    “You could have fought me,” he said. “Why didn’t you until it was too late?”
    “I thought I loved you,” Elyssa said, her voice as low and vicious as Hunter’s. “I thought you loved me. I thought you were just reluctant to show it because of your first wife.”
    Shocked silence was Hunter’s only answer.
    Then, softly, he said, “You little fool.”
    “For once we are in complete agreement.”
    “Weren’t you listening to me?” Hunter demanded. “Did I ever talk about anything but lust between us?”
    Humiliation and rage fought for possession of Elyssa’s tongue. Both won.
    “No and no. But I’m listening now, fancy man. I’m all bloody ears.”
    “Too damned late,” he snarled.
    Elyssa didn’t argue with that, either.
    Silence claimed the room.
    “What is that stink?” Hunter finally asked irritably.
    “Whatever I was wearing when I left your room.”
    The cool precision of Elyssa’s voice and the continuous, rippling shine of tears on her face told Hunter how precariously she was in control of herself.
    Not that he blamed Elyssa. At the moment, he was feeling a little precarious about control himself.
    “God, what a tangle,” he whispered.
    Elyssa ignored Hunter, concentrating instead on controlling herself.
    It had never been more difficult.
    “Well, there’s no help for it,” Hunter said in a low voice. “I’ll have to marry you.”
    Elyssa’s head whipped toward him in disbelief.
    Hunter didn’t notice. He was too caught in the tanglehe had made of what should have been a simple, straightforward affair.
    “Tomorrow we’ll tell everyone we’re engaged,” Hunter said. “As soon as this mess with the Culpeppers is cleared up, I’ll find a preacher and we’ll get married.”
    Elyssa stared at Hunter as if