White Fire

“Why would it?” she asked, her eyes innocently wide.

“You will be marrying a man who has two children,” he said softly. “When it was just my son, you were willing to marry me. Now that there is also Dancing Star, and you will be the mother of two children instead of one, does that make you hesitate at all about marrying me?”

Flame flung herself into his arms. “Nothing could ever change my mind about marrying you,” she murmured. “I shall be the best mother ever to the children. I love children.”

“Tomorrow we shall find us a preacher and speak vows that will make us a true family,” White Fire said. He wove his fingers through her hair and drew her lips to his.

Then they pulled apart from one another. “Let us go now to my home,” White Fire said, offering a hand to Flame. “I believe someone awaits us there.”

Flame took his hand. Without looking back at the comforts that she would be leaving behind forever, she went down the stairs and outside into the moon-splashed night.

Again without looking back, she went with him to the stables and chose one of her most favored horses. It was a gift from her father last Christmas—a black stallion with white spots on its ears. She saddled it and handed the reins to White Fire.

“My gift to you,” she murmured. “For all the trouble my father has put you through, please take this gift and know that I am giving it to you from the bottom of my heart.”

He stepped up to the horse and ran his hands down is withers. “A lovely bridegroom price, I would say,” he said, laughing softly as he glanced over at Flame.

“Yes, a lovely bridegroom price,” she said, her eyes locking with his.

They floated into one another’s arms and shared a long and sweet kiss.

Then they rode from the fort, leaving so much unhappiness behind them.

But White Fire could not help but look over his shoulder and take one last look at the study where he had shared so much with his friend Josiah Snelling. He wished there was a way to thank the colonel for what he had done for him tonight.

Josiah, more than anyone else, had saved White Fire’s life.

Chapter 37

Oh, could the Fair, who this does see,

Be by this great example won,

And learn but thus to smile on me,

As they smile on the kissing sun!

—Richard Leigh

Soft kisses being feathered across her brow, and then her cheeks, awakened Flame. She sighed and lay there for a moment longer enjoying that it was White Fire who was giving her such soft, sweet kisses; that it was White Fire who was all right, and that he was with her now, for always.

When she felt his hands touch her naked breasts, her nipples quickly hardened against his palms, igniting all of Flame’s senses. She inhaled a quick breath of instant pleasure.

Fluttering her eyes open, she smiled up at White Fire, then gasped with rapture when one of his hands moved lower and he began to stroke the tender flesh where her desire was centered.

“I love you so,” she whispered, reaching her hands up to cradle his face in her hands. “Darling, kiss me. Please . . . kiss . . . me.”

She brought his face down to hers. Her lips trembled beneath his mouth as he gave her a meltingly hot kiss, his nude, bronze body sliding over hers. His swollen manhood heavy against her right leg, she was in awe again at its length and firmness.

As he moved his heaviness against her leg while his fingers continued to stroke her woman’s center, she writhed in response, soft moans repeatedly surfacing from inside her.

Drawing a ragged breath, she twined her arms around his neck and clung to his rock hardness. She gave herself up to the rapture as he continued kissing her with a fierce, possessive heat born of having thought for a while that they had lost each other forever.

The raging hunger built inside Flame. With the portion of her mind that was not stolen away by the heat of her passion, she thought of how wonderful it was to be there when it could have been so different. Had Colonel Edwards not arrived in time the prior evening....

No. She would not think of the possibilities.

She would only think of the wonders of having seen White Fire and Dancing Star together when they had arrived home. It had taken awhile to stir Dancing Star awake, so she could unlatch the door.