Blackwolf's Redemption

It was almost enough to make a man and a woman forget that she had come here in a way neither of them understood. And when that wasn’t quite enough to keep the truth at bay, being alone together in Jesse’s big, wide bed surely was.

It was, Sienna was certain, the most perfect place in the world to lie in your lover’s arms. To tremble with passion as he entered you. To fall into dreamless sleep and then come awake to his slow, deep moonlit kisses or to the hot, sun-tinged stroke of his hands.

She had never been this happy in her life. Jesse was—he was wonderful. Good and kind. Exciting and sexy. He was everything she’d ever hoped a man could be, a complex mass of contradictions and juxtapositions that were absolutely amazing. He knew how to leave a mass of salesclerks swooning in his wake after an afternoon of nonstop, far-too-expensive shopping and then cap it off by buying her a tacky and adorable stuffed toy from a street vendor whose pitch made her laugh. He could confer with the snootiest sommelier as easily as he could get lunch at a hot-dog stand. And, as she quickly learned, he was fine with letting her choose what she wanted to drink and eat, and in ordering them without his help.

And when she figured out that he’d deliberately baited her on their first evening in the city, she called him an awful man and ruined the effect by flinging herself into his arms and kissing him.

Her Jesse was, yes, wonderful.

And all at once, looking at him one morning over late coffee in his sun-filled apartment, Sienna felt as if the earth had suddenly tilted under her feet.

She was in love with him.

The cup in her hand trembled. She put it down and tried to tell herself it wasn’t true. She couldn’t have let that happen. Loving Jesse was a dangerous, foolish thing. Bad enough she’d become his responsibility, but to love him, to want him to love her when passion, not love, was on his agenda…

“Sienna.” Jesse rose from his chair and came quickly to her side. “Baby, what is it?”

“Nothing. I’m—I’m fine.”

“The hell you are.” He drew her chair back, lifted her to her feet. “You’re not happy.”

“Jesse—”

“With me? Or with being here?”

“Oh, no, it isn’t you! It could never be—”

“Do you miss 2010?” His jaw tightened. “Do you wish you could go back?”

He had never asked her those questions. And she hadn’t given them much thought. At first, she’d been too busy trying to accept what had happened, but yes, at the beginning, if there’d been a way to return to her own time…

“The only place I want to be is right here.”

Jesse felt as if he’d been holding his breath. “Good,” he said gruffly. “Because we’re going home.”

“Home?”

“To Montana. It’s where I really belong. And where I want—where I want you to be with me.”

“Are you sure? I mean, I can get a job here, you know? Find a place to live—”

Jesse silenced her with a kiss. It was a long, tender kiss; he felt her holding back, and then, gradually, her lips softened, clung to his, and when he finally lifted his head and looked into her eyes, he felt as if a blindfold had been torn from his eyes.

Somewhere between the sacred stone in the wild beauty of Blackwolf Canyon and this very unsacred high-rise in the sophisticated beauty of San Francisco, everything in him had changed. And Sienna was the reason.

He was in love. Deeply in love, for the very first time in his life.

Was it too soon to tell her that? Would she want to hear it? She’d gone through so much in such a short time….

“Jesse.” Her voice was a husky whisper. “Do you mean it? Do you want me to—to be with you?”

He threaded his fingers into her hair, lifted her face to his. Maybe she needed some breathing room. He could say he was offering her a safe place until she decided what to do next—

But lying to her was impossible.

“Yes,” he said gruffly. “I want that more than my next breath.”

She rose on her toes and kissed him. It was a kiss filled with all the promise a man could want. He drew her against him, returned the kiss, took it slow and deep and hot until she moaned into his mouth.

Then he undressed her. Touched her. Drew her onto a chaise longue where he followed each stroke of his hand with a stroke of his tongue and when they were both half crazy with hunger, he entered her.

And knew he wanted her to be his, forever.

They flew back to Montana that evening.

Home, Jesse had called it, and that was the way it felt to Sienna, but then, what was it someone had once said? Home was where the heart was. And her heart was here, with Jesse. The year could be 1975. It could be 2075. It could be anything, just as long as she was in his arms.