The Raider (Montgomery/Taggert 9)

“Why weren’t you asleep?”

His face was very close to hers and he gave her such a hot look that Jess could feel her skin warming. “I haven’t been sleeping much lately.”

Jess tried to recover herself. “Alex, your health can’t stand this dampness. I insist you—”

“Quiet!” he commanded as he looked through the trees toward Pitman. “Tell me what’s going on—and I want no lies, Jessica.”

She smiled in the darkness. It amazed her that she’d not realized Alex and the Raider were one and the same. “Pitman offered me a purseful of gold for my land.”

“For that land?” Alex gasped.

Jess gave him a look of disgust.

“What’s he doing?”

Jess strained upward to see. “He’s just pulled in a net of oysters, he’s opening them and now he’s throwing them away.”

Alex raised himself. “Is he putting that oyster in his pocket?”

Jess grinned. “Oysters in lint sauce.”

Alex grimaced.

Jess sat back down. Alex was hovering over her and she looked at him. The cotton padding in his breeches was lumpy and concealed his muscular thighs but there was no padding in his big calves. They came from years of walking on a swaying deck.

“If only the Raider were here,” Jess sighed wistfully. “He’d know what to do.”

Alex sat down beside her, keeping Pitman in view. “I thought you said his brawn was more than his brains.”

“When it comes to acts of courage, he intuits what needs to be done. Animal instinct.”

Alex’s eyelids lowered. “Jess, are you seeing him again?”

“Not like you mean. He tries to persuade me to come to his bed, but I resist. I am your faithful wife.”

“Why you little—”

“He’s leaving,” Jess said and rolled under Alex’s body, snuggling against his warmth. If there was one thing she knew how to do, it was silence Alexander.

Alex seemed to forget Pitman as he slid down beside Jess and began kissing her.

Jess was losing her resolve. “Alex, don’t you think we should see what Pitman was doing?”

“In a minute,” he murmured, seeking her lips again.

“Alex!” She pushed at him with all her might. “At first I can’t get you to kiss me and now you won’t stop. Let’s get out of here, I’m getting cold,” she lied. The truth was, the small of her back was beginning to sweat. I’ll have to stop this soon, she thought, because I’ll not be able to last.

She managed to roll out from under Alex and stand, her breasts heaving, her face flushed, her body yearning for his. She lifted her skirts, turned on her heel and started running toward the water.

Once she was away from Alex, she could think more clearly. She knew some rotting nets had been left at the back of the house and she retrieved the best one now. When she returned, Alex was standing at the edge of the water.

She refused to look at him. A couple more of those hot, longing glances of his and they’d be tumbling about on the sand.

“Jessie.”

“Stand over there, Alex, and find some flint. I’m going to haul up some oysters and you’re going to open them. And don’t you dare touch me. Go!”

Alex smiled slightly and left her as she tossed him the first couple of oysters. “You know, Jess, I’m not really as ill as you think. In fact, in this moonlight with you looking so lovely I just might be able to—”