The Lover

The Lover by Genell Dellin Page A

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Authors: Genell Dellin
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her as if he felt her watching him. The moonbeam drifted back and forth over his lips. He had the most sensual lips in the world.
    How did they taste? What would it be like to kiss him?
    The thought came with such an overwhelming urge to find out that it shocked her. She had to get away from him, pillow or no pillow.
    Yet she didn’t move. The breeze strengthened. It lifted her hair that was falling all about her face and shoulders and brushed it against her cheek.
    How would it feel if it were Eagle Jack’s fingers brushing against her skin, instead?
    Again, the little frisson of fear raced through her blood. What would it be like on the trail with him—with all the men believing that they were married?
    Why, darlin’, we don’t want the men to think we’re havin’ trouble, now do we?
    Would he come into her tent at night the way he had come into her room? What would she say or do if he did?
    They needed to have a talk about that remark of his and reach an agreement before they ever started north.
    But what would he say or do if she brought it up?
    She shook her hair back and made herself stop imagining. She couldn’t even think right. How could he do this to her when he was asleep ?
    Resolutely, she knelt beside him. Get this done, get back in bed, get to sleep. Get on the trail tomorrow.
    One day. She had known this man for one day and he was taking over her thoughts and her imaginings. She would have no more of that.
    Susanna lifted his head gently and, when he moved his arm, she began to slip the pillow into place. But a bruise ran from his cheekbone down across his jaw, and in the moonlight she could see that the knot on the back of his head had grown since Salado.
    She should make a poultice for it. She had mentioned it, and he had refused, true, but she should’ve insisted.
    Eagle Jack could’ve ridden off and left her the minute he was free and out on the street. Instead, he’d kept his word and, as Maynell had pointed out, he had not only worked her cattle but had risked getting shot for her sake.
    Gratitude or not, though, she had no call to be sitting here on her knees all night, holding his head. Her fingertips brushed along the line of his jaw as she slipped her hand out from between his head and the pillow.
    She let them touch him again and linger, then she skimmed them across the aristocratic rise of his cheekbone. His looks were a fascination to her.
    That thought brought her scrambling to her feet. She was losing her reason, and that was nocondition to be in while trying to drive a herd of cattle across a pasture, much less for hundreds of miles.
    Silently, she berated herself as she made her way through the dark room and into the kitchen. She had been chary of her feelings for her whole life, she guessed. Especially since she’d been old enough to know that her mother died and left her when she was born. All her growing up, her cousins and aunts had called her the no-nonsense one because all her life she had kept a strict control on her emotions. Now here she was, on the eve of her biggest venture, going off into some dream world that didn’t make a lick of sense.
    Forcing her mind onto practical matters, which was where it almost always stayed, she went to the box of medical supplies that she’d already packed. She took out the jar of antipholgistine and set it on top of the stove, which was still warm enough to soften its sticky, waxy consistency. Then she cut a circle of cloth from the tough canvas scrap in the bottom of the box and held it against the stove to warm it, too.
    As soon as she had doctored him, she’d get into bed. As soon as she got into bed, she’d go to sleep. Her conscience would be satisfied, and she would sleep.
    This racing of her heart would slow to a normal pace and she would stop thinking about how his mouth looked in the moonlight.
    She would forget about the feel of his thick hair falling like heavy water through her

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