“Hawk, shush! The entire camp can hear?—”
He lifted her by her upper arms, throwing her back down upon the cot. “You could have been killed. And I was nearly helpless to do a damned thing about it. If Sarah hadn’t come for me … Tomorrow—tomorrow we head back to Mayfair, and so help me, Skylar, so help me! You’re going to tell me what’s going on!”
“I don’t know what’s going on!”
His fingers squeezed her arms painfully. His features were dark, constricted, his eyes gleaming with a furious green fire. He looked as if he longed to throttle her himself.
“Damn you, Skylar!” he hissed.
His hold upon her eased. Then he rose, swearing heatedly.
He walked out of the tent.
Skylar tossed. Turned. Lay awake. Tossed and turned again. Where was he? Why wasn’t he coming back? Why did he think she could possibly have an explanation for the strange behavior of Indians?
At last, in exhaustion and misery, she dozed. Then she slept deeply.
No monsters troubled her dreams.
No monsters. Her dreams were sweet. She felt his touch. Featherlight. Erotic. Sensual.
His fingers…along her thighs. Palms, cradling her breasts. His lips upon her bare nape. Lower. His hands again, smoothing around her hips. Pressing downward. Stroking. His lips lower against her back. Lower. His touch, turning her. His lips. The fiery hot liquid stroke of his tongue…
She moaned. Writhed. Awoke…
He was no dream.
She remembered to be angry. Too late. He had taken his time seducing her from sleep. He took his passion quickly. She couldn’t deny her response.
But when it was done…
She turned her back on him.
She simply didn’t have the answers he was demanding.
And he…
He was refusing to believe.
“You can’t do this!” she choked out to him.
He was quiet a moment. “I did do this.”
“You can’t do this to me!”
“Skylar, you do not know what you have done to me,” he told her.
And he turned his back on her.
The next morning, the army doctor said that Willow could travel. He’d have a bump on his head for a few weeks from therock that had knocked him senseless from his horse, but other than that, he seemed fine.
With very little conversation between them, Skylar and Hawk started home with Willow and Sloan.
The meeting had yielded what they had feared it would.
Nothing.
CHAPTER 23
