Only 06 - Winter Fire

head lifted sharply. “Did he bruise you?”
    â€œOnly when I wouldn’t hold still. Then he…”
    Sarah’s voice died.
    â€œWhat did he do?” Case asked gently, wondering ifshe had mistaken passion for ill use. “I don’t want to scare you.”
    â€œHe just grabbed my breasts and dug in with his fingernails until I quit fighting.”
    For a moment Case couldn’t even speak.
    It’s a good thing Conner killed Hal accidentally , he thought. I sure as hell would have done it deliberately, and hanged for it .
    â€œI would never hurt you that way,” Case said simply.
    She hesitated, then let out a ragged little breath.
    â€œAll right,” she said in a rush. “You can do what—what you said you wanted to.”
    â€œIt will feel better without your chemise. For both of us.”
    â€œNothing covering me?” she asked in a high voice.
    â€œMy mouth. My hands.”
    She shivered at the thought of wearing him as intimately as her own underclothes.
    â€œAll right,” she whispered, for her mouth was too dry to speak any other way.
    He took off her shirt and shifted her until she was lying on her back with the doeskin beneath her. His hands slid up along her ribs beneath her chemise. He lifted his thumbs to ease the muslin up over her aroused breasts.
    And then he simply looked at her.
    â€œLord, woman,” he breathed. “You put the sun and moon to shame.”
    Sarah blushed from her breasts to her forehead.
    He bent and smoothed his face against her, from her collarbone down over each breast and back again, kissing and stroking every bit of the way. The thought of such delicate beauty being savaged by any man, even her lawful husband, made Case want to lick and kiss and pet away every last memory of pain.
    Bracing himself on his elbows, he dipped his face between her breasts, stroking her, aching for the ill treatment she had known. If he could have, he would have takenher pain inside himself, all of it, leaving her with only the pleasure.
    The thought that such a healing might be possible was almost agonizing to him. He shuddered and redoubled his caresses, tenderly devouring her.
    For Sarah, it was like her dream all over again, with the sun worshipping her naked skin. The rough silk of his beard brought her breasts to aching peaks that were soothed by his tongue and caressed by his fingertips and palms. Her breasts were flushed and taut, fully alive for the first time in her life.
    She made a hoarse sound and jerked when his mouth closed over a nipple.
    â€œI’ve never done this with a woman,” Case whispered, lifting his head. “You’ll have to tell me if I do something you don’t like.”
    At first she didn’t really hear the words, for she was too caught up in the pleasure that rippled and shimmered through her to understand anything else.
    â€œNever done this?” she managed finally.
    â€œNot like this.”
    â€œHow is it different?”
    â€œI want to take all the pain and leave sweetness in its place. Before now, all I wanted was…”
    His voice died as he kissed the inner curve of Sarah’s breasts, then raked his teeth with exquisite care over each nipple. The jerk of her response and her fingers clenching suddenly in his hair told him just how much she enjoyed his caresses.
    â€œHell,” he said huskily. “I can’t even remember how it was before. I just know it wasn’t like this.”
    He lowered his head and delicately consumed her breasts, lingering over the hard pink tips.
    â€œThere’s more of you I want to pet and pleasure,” he said. “Will you let me?”
    Her only answer was a dazed sound and her fingers silently urging his head back to her hungry breasts.
    â€œYou’ll like it even more than what I’ve done so far,” he said. “Let me touch all of you, honey. Let me.”
    â€œIt won’t…hurt?” she asked raggedly.
    â€œHave you ever felt something so good it almost hurt?” he whispered.
    â€œYou mean, like the song of the first meadowlark in spring?”
    Her words made him clench with pain and pleasure combined. He had never guessed that anyone else felt like that about hearing a meadowlark for the first time after winter’s long, icy silence.
    Until this instant, Case had forgotten what it was to feel like that himself.
    â€œYes,” he said unevenly. “Like a silver