Blackwolf's Redemption

She beat at his shoulders and he caught her wrists, dragged her arms high above her head, forced his knee between her thighs.

“No! Jesse, no, no, no…”

His big body stilled. Then he let go of her wrists, rolled away and got to his feet.

Naked, without his body covering hers, a cold as deep as the surrounding darkness settled against Sienna’s skin. Her teeth chattered; she rolled onto her side. Something fell over her. Terry cloth. A robe? Whatever it was, she covered herself with it and scrambled up against the pillows. Light blazed down. She threw up a hand to shield her eyes and saw Jesse standing over her, the lantern in his hand.

Half naked, his sweats hanging low on his hips, he stood motionless. His hair was loose and hung to his jaw. He’d wiped away the black stripes, but the eagle talon still swung from its rawhide thong. He was, somehow, a remarkable mixture of savagery and civilization, wild and dangerous…

And incredibly beautiful.

Heat rushed through her. What would it have been like to have felt him possessing her?

“That’s a risky game to play,” he said in a low voice.

Her eyes flew to his. “It wasn’t a game,” she said, rushing the words. “I never meant—” Sienna hesitated. She wanted to blame what had happened on him but she couldn’t. “Everything—everything’s confused,” she said in a tremulous whisper. “There’s so much going on….” She swallowed. “I’m sorry.”

He gave a harsh laugh. “Yeah. So am I.”

“I don’t—I don’t know what…what happened. I’m not—”

“Frankly, I don’t give a damn what you are or aren’t. You won’t be here long enough for it to mean anything. As soon as the storm ends, I want you off my land.”

She nodded. It was what she wanted, too. Somewhere out there, people had to be missing her. Looking for her…

“Get some clothes on. There’s stuff in the dressing room.” He leaned forward and placed the lantern on the nightstand. “I’ll be in the kitchen, putting together something to eat.”

“Really, that’s not nec—”

“I decide what’s necessary around here, lady. Get that through your head.”

“Jesse. Mr. Blackwolf—”

“Put on a couple of layers of clothing. Without power, it’s going to be a long, cold night.”

Sienna nodded, watching as he headed for the door. Stupid, she knew, but the thought of him vanishing into the dark in this unknown place made her uneasy.

“Wait!”

He swung toward her. “What now?”

“The light. Don’t you need it?”

He reached for the candle. “This will do me just fine.”

The door slammed after him, and Sienna was alone.

She waited for what seemed a very long.

The question wasn’t would he come back, but would her legs hold her when she stood up? She felt shaky. That she’d come within a heartbeat of letting a hard-edged stranger who thought she was some kind of thief almost take her to bed seemed impossible….

Sienna let out a shaky breath.

Be honest, at least!

Jesse Blackwolf hadn’t been the aggressor. She’d been as eager as he. She’d wanted him to make love to her, wanted him more than she’d ever wanted a man before. Not that there’d been many to start with. A boy in her junior year at college, another at the start of her postgraduate studies—her sex life was pretty pathetic by 2010 standards.

How about by the standards of 1975? She tried to remember what she knew of sex in the seventies. Free love? Sexual equality?

Not that it mattered.

She’d reacted to Jesse on her own terms, not those of any particular year or era. His touch, his taste, the feel of him against her…

She shut her eyes, let herself remember it all. The texture of his silky hair, the hard planes of his shoulders and chest, the press of his erection. The heat, the warmth of his kisses.

Desire, something so potent she couldn’t think of a name for it, had caught her in its grasp. All she’d wanted was to be in Jesse’s arms, to know what it was like to belong to him….

“Stop it,” she said sharply.

She wasn’t like that; she didn’t want to be like that. Sex had a place in a woman’s life and that was exactly the way it should be, it should have a place in a woman’s life. End of story.

What had just happened was nothing but the end result of a day that had started in one time and ended in another, and no, absolutely no, she was not going to think about that now!

Sienna sat up, pulled on the robe—Jesse’s, of course. She could tell by the size, which dwarfed her. By the scent, redolent of mountain air, pine and man. Then she headed for the dressing room, lantern in her hand….