Kid Calhoun Read Free Page A

smoothed over her hair, all the way down to her hips. It felt good. Comforting.
    “Do that again,” she murmured.
    He did as she asked, then slipped his hand under her hair and caressed the length of her back, from the dimples in her buttocks up her backbone, until he finally circled her nape with his hand.
    Anabeth shivered. “Don’t stop.”
    Wolf’s hand skimmed the length of her again, and Anabeth couldn’t help the soft sound of pleasure thatescaped her. She was jarred when Wolf put both hands on her hips and pushed her away.
    “Why did you stop?” she asked. “That felt good. Will you do it again?”
    Abruptly, he turned his back on her.
    “What’s wrong?” She reached out to touch his shoulder, but he flinched away from her.
    “You do not want me,” he said in a curt voice.
    “What?”
    He turned to face her, and she saw the frustration in his dark eyes. “I do not see a woman’s passion when I look into your eyes.”
    “What?” She had known for some time that she didn’t react as other women did to a man, but it was still a shock to hear Wolf say the words aloud.
    “You do not desire me.”
    He sounded so unhappy that for a moment Anabeth was tempted to lie. But she met his brooding gaze and knew he would see the truth in her eyes. “No,” she admitted. “I don’t.”
    His lips flattened in dissatisfaction.
    Her temper flared. “Did you want me to lie?”
    “No. There has always been truth between us. So I will tell you this. I want you for my woman. And I will have you.”
    “But that’s ridiculous. I don’t desire you! I can’t—”
    “Enough!” His voice was sharp. “There is nothing more to be said now.”
    Anabeth was angry. “We’ll talk about this right now! I don’t think—”
    “Helllllooooooo! Anabeeeetttthhh. Where are yoooooou?”
    Anabeth had whirled at the sound of her uncle’s voice echoing down the valley. “It’s Uncle Booth! You’d better go now. I—”
    When she had turned around, Wolf was gone. He had disappeared as though he were never there. Itwas something every Apache learned from birth, as hunted beasts do, because moving quickly and silently meant the difference between life and death. Wolf had taught Anabeth how it was done, though she was not nearly so good at it as he was.
    As she loosened the breechclout and let it fall to the stone beneath her, she felt a sense of frustration, of things left unfinished. She pulled on long johns, socks, shirt, jeans, and boots, all the while remembering the look on Wolf’s face before he had left her. The hardness and the determination had been very unsettling.
    She stuffed the wet buckskins into a hidden crevice in the rocks by the pond where her uncle wouldn’t find them. Later, when Booth was not around, she would come back and lay them out to dry. She was frowning when she headed for the entrance to the valley. If she hadn’t known Wolf, trusted him as she did, she might even have been afraid of him after what had just happened.
    Above all, she was left with the feeling of having failed somehow as a woman. She had been tempted to speak to Booth about the problem, but there was no way she could do so without bringing Wolf into the conversation. She could not betray the Apache’s existence without endangering his life.
    Anabeth had done her best to ignore what had happened, or rather,
not
happened, between her and Wolf. Maybe she wasn’t a whole woman. That didn’t keep her from wanting the silk taffeta dress in the next window, even though she could never wear it so long as she remained Kid Calhoun.
    Anabeth turned her feet in the direction of the hotel and continued down the boardwalk. She kept her eyes straight ahead, aware of the way men and women both avoided her. The law in Santa Fe kept an eye on Booth’s gang, but none of them had ever beenarrested. So far, no victim of any of the robberies had ever positively identified anyone in the Calhoun Gang.
    Anabeth intended to keep it that way. Which