Swift Horse

The hot touch of his body against hers and the way his lean, sinewy buttocks moved in such a steady rhythm made a passion burn higher within her. She grew feverish as he cradled her now, their bodies molded together and moving rhythmically as one.

Swift Horse groaned as he felt the tightness in his loins coil intensely as he moved within Marsha slowly, yet deliberately. His tongue brushed her lips lightly, his eyes dark and stormy as he gazed down at her.

“Kiss me again . . . hold me more tightly,” Marsha whispered, her ankles locked about him as his lips bore down upon her in a savage kiss.

When he moved, she moved. When the pleasure began to peak for one, it did for the other. They clung and rocked together as that ultimate joy was reached and savored, then they lay still together, breathing hard.

“I am so glad for my brother,” she murmured. “And also for your sister. Wasn’t their ceremony such a glorious sight to see? Their happiness is the same as ours, Swift Horse. And soon we will say vows that will make our own happiness complete.”

His hand made a slow, sensuous descent along her spine as he gazed

at her, his face now a mask of naked desire. “I had not known such a love as ours could exist—such a woman as you could exist,” he said. His gaze moved slowly over her, as though in a caress, seeing her perfect in every way.

He bent his lips to a breast and drew a nipple between his lips and flicked his tongue around it, drawing a sensual moan from within her. He moved over her again, their bodies straining together. His hands wove through her silken hair as he drew her lips to his.

Marsha’s pulse raced as she felt his manhood filling her again. “Every breath I take is yours,” she whispered against his lips. “Please, oh, please never stop loving me.”

A soft cry of passion escaped from between her parted lips as he plunged his hardness inside her. As his dark, stormy eyes gazed at her, she placed a hand to his cheek and smiled at him as he began his easy strokes within her. Her breathing grew ragged when his hands cupped her breasts and his thumbs circled her nipples, drawing them into tautness.

Marsha twined her arms around his neck and urged his lips to hers. Passion erupted between them as they kissed, their tongues meeting as their lips parted.

With an instinct for pleasure now that had been borne within her that first moment of Swift Horse’s showing her the true meaning of love, her hips moved in unison with his eager thrusts. Raking her fingernails down his back, she moved her hands to his buttocks and splayed her fingers across his hard body. She urged him closer, reveling in the feel of his wondrous thrusts inside her.

And then he slowed his body and withdrew his hardness, breathing heavily as he pressed his lips to the delicate column of her throat.

“I never want our time together like this to end,” he said huskily. “But the real world always awaits us.”

“Not yet,” she said, kissing him.

They moved together again for a moment longer, then again went over the edge that overwhelmed them both, the pleasure so intense, so wondrous to behold. And then they lay quietly together again, only now aware of the laughter outside the lodge, and remembering the celebration of renewal—the beginning of a new Creek year.

“My people celebrate the new year at another time than you do, and in a different way,” Marsha murmured, aching when she recalled those New Year’s Eves with her parents, and how her mother always made black-eyed peas the next day, a ritual she never forgot. They gave hope to the new year, her mother had always told her.

“Will you spend the night with me?” Swift Horse suddenly blurted out. “Your brother and his new bride might need their privacy.”

“Yes, I had thought of that, too, since our cabin is not all that large,” Marsha said, remembering how her brother had cleaned up his own bedroom on the day of his wedding, shocking Marsha to no end when she watched from the door as he struggled to put the sheets on the bed.

“Then you will stay?” Swift Horse asked, gently touching her cheek.

“Yes, I will stay,” Marsha murmured, cuddling closer to him.

She hated it when she yawned, but it had been a long and tiring day and she only now realized how exhausted she was.

“You are tired,” Swift Horse said softly. “Sleep, my woman. I shall hold you as you sleep.”

“Then I shall dream of angels all night long,” she said, laughing softly.

“Angels?” he asked, searching her eyes.

“Mother always told me to dream of angels when she tucked me in at night when I was a child,” she murmured. “That was the same as telling me to sleep in peace and love.”

“And did you?” he asked, smoothing a fallen lock of hair back from her face.

“Always, until—” she said, her voice breaking.

“Until when?” he said, yet thinking he knew the answer. When her parents had died, that part of her that gave her peace at night had surely died, as well.

“Until my parents died,” she blurted out. Tears filling her eyes, she turned and clung to him. “But now I have you,” she said, her voice breaking. “Hold me, darling. Hold me and never let me go.”