The Legend Of Love Page 23

  Her smile was now completely gone. The wispy hair at the nape of her neck lifted and her heart was no longer speeding from excitement but from apprehension and fear. Her legs weak, Elizabeth slowly rose to her feet.

  She almost jumped out of her skin when with a loud splash West lunged up out of the water directly before her. Easily levering himself up onto the bank in one fluid movement, he stood there, brown and shimmering in the last rays of the sun.

  As naked as the day he was born.

  Thunderstruck, Elizabeth could only stare, her lips parted in surprise and awe. With the unconscious grace that was so much a part of him, he came directly toward her while the water sluiced down his lean brown body. Muscles bunched and stretched, the sleek dark skin rippling smoothly, his stomach falling away in a succession of hard ridges, all gleaming. His arms and legs were long and powerful beneath the sleek wet skin. His blue-black hair was plastered to his head and diamonds of water beaded the thick curling hair on his chest and at his groin.

  His gray eyes glinted silver in the dying sunlight and his teeth—those perfect straight white teeth—shone in a disarmingly devilish smile. Overwhelmed by his startling dark good looks, Elizabeth hugged his clothes to her chest and shook her head as if to clear it.

  That habitual teasing nature of his more strongly in evidence than ever, he stepped right up to her and placed the tip of his wet forefinger against the pulse in her throat. He felt its furious drumming.

  Smiling broadly, he took his clothes away from her, dropped them to the ground, and lowered his hand to the silver concho belt circling Elizabeth’s small waist. None too gently he pulled her by the belt up against his tall, wet frame, letting her feel the hard, naked contours.

  “Hell, I surrender,” he teased. “If you want me this badly, you can have me.”

  He bent his head to kiss her, but she turned her face away. Against his wet, muscular shoulder she warned, “Let go of me, Quarternight, or I’ll scream!”

  His lips in her flaming red hair, he said, “Do and you’ll have one devil of a time explaining why you sneaked down here to join me.”

  Her head snapped up. She glared at him. “I didn’t come down here to join you. I came to—”

  “To get a glimpse of me naked? Here, I’ll stand back a little so you can get a good look.” He loosened his hold on her.

  “No!” She clasped his slick biceps and pulled him back to her. “I do not want to look at you.”

  “No?”

  “No.”

  West covered one of her clasping hands with his own and drew it between them. “Then you may touch me. Don’t feel ashamed. Is that what you’re after?”

  “I am after nothing,” Elizabeth said, irritably scraping her long, punishing nails down his wet chest until he flinched. “It was foolish of me to come here. I’m sorry that I did.”

  “Don’t be. I’m always delighted to have your company.”

  “Yes, well, your delight is about to come to an end. Drop your hands from me, but don’t move back. Stay right where you are while I turn around.”

  “As you wish, Mrs. Curtin.” West allowed his hands to fall to his sides.

  “Thank you. I appreciate that,” she said, looking into his silver eyes.

  She swiftly did an about-face, her turn executed so close to him, she avoided again seeing his nakedness. She drew in a long breath and was about to step away from him. But that breath came out in a loud rush when his long, wet arms came around her and West slammed her back against his hard body.

  “So you don’t want to see me?” he said, his arms tightening dangerously. “You don’t want to touch me?” The words came out in a low, steady voice made more frightening by its lack of expression.

  “That’s what I said.”

  “Are you telling the truth?” he asked, in a tone that said he knew damn well she wasn’t.

  “Yes,” she managed, wanting it to be the truth, hoping that it was.

  “Ah, that’s too bad,” he said. “With me it’s just the opposite. When I came down to the river where you were bathing, it was just to see you. And I didn’t see nearly enough to suit me.” His hand abruptly lifted from her waist, his long brown fingers wrapped themselves gently around her throat and pressed her head back against his wet chest. He leaned down and said just above her ear, “And I want to touch you, even though you swear you don’t want to touch me.”

  “Yes, well, touching me wouldn’t do you a bit of good,” she said coldly, hoping he didn’t mean to touch her now, knowing full well that he did.

  “We’ll see,” he said, and his fingertips began gently to stroke her throat. To her disgust Elizabeth felt her face grow flush and warm. She hoped he hadn’t caught the quickening tempo of her breathing and knew he had when those stroking fingers slid down inside the opening of her pullover shirt.

  While his thumb rested on her collarbone, his fingers fanned tantalizingly over her flesh and settled into the nervous warmth of her underarm. It was then that his other hand began to move. Deserting the silver concho belt around her waist, it moved down to spread over her flat belly, the tips of his fingers gently applying pressure.

  At once her clothes felt tight and confining and she became very aware of his body, naked and hot, pressed against hers. Her lips parted, her neck arched, and she leaned back against him, his bare hard frame supporting hers.

  His hand returned to the silver concho belt at her waist, and Elizabeth felt relief. Her head came up off his chest, her eyes lowered to the tanned fingers toying with one of the circular silver disks. She started to say something, to make some cutting comment. But before she could speak those tanned wet fingers again deserted the belt.

  West bent his head so that his dark, glistening cheek was pressed to hers. They both silently watched as the tips of his fingers found and settled on the seam that went down the center of Elizabeth’s rust suede pants.

  Elizabeth’s breath caught in her throat when those fingertips slowly, enticingly moved downward, tracing the fabric’s seam, igniting the flesh beneath. Mesmerized by the sensual sight of those lean brown fingers gliding down the middle of her quivering belly, Elizabeth swallowed hard when at last those moving magical fingers reached the spot where the seam of the trousers met the seam of her pliant woman’s body.

  West turned his face in and kissed her flushed cheek as his fingers gently caressed her. Allowing his middle finger to dominate, to slip between her legs and apply just the right amount of pressure, he kissed the corner of her open mouth.

  A sweet warm suffusion began deep inside Elizabeth, thrilling her, frightening her. Arms hanging limply at her sides, she stood there waiting for him to stop, hoping that he would, and soon.

  She was just beginning to hope that he wouldn’t when his hands abruptly fell away from her, his droll sense of humor returning. “Well, what do you know, you were right. Touching you didn’t do me a bit of good. Get on back to camp. Heck, I know when I’m beat.”

  28

  DANE CURTIN STARED AT his empty glass. He smiled, poured himself another, and sipped, allowing the smooth rich brandy to spill over his tongue and glide down his throat. When the warmth reached his chest, he sighed and stretched contentedly.

  Dane licked his wide lips and gazed about his dazzling palace. The underground palace was filled with deep, clear pools and rock-embellished grottos and rare crystal formations—vast chambers with soaring domed ceilings and dense forests of pure white stalactites, stalagmites, and great hanging curtains of varicolored stone.

  And gold.

  A treasure of glittering, spendable gold!

  Thick dusky lashes fluttering low over his gleaming emerald eyes, Dane smiled with deep satisfaction. Here in his cool, shadowy kingdom eight hundred feet below the parched deserts above, he ruled supreme. To those whom he governed he was more than a mere monarch. He was god and master.

  Dane laughed suddenly, the sound of his laughter echoing off the shadowed rocky walls of his private chambers. Twisting a
glistening golden curl around his long, pale forefinger, he continued to laugh almost giddily.

  Stretched out on his fur-covered couch, his long diaphanous robes hiding nothing of his slender, glorious physique, even Dane Curtin felt he truly was a god. A beautiful god. His hair, grown quite long from his weeks below ground, was a mass of gleaming golden curls and his flesh was as pale as ice. No wonder he was worshiped.

  Dane poured himself another brandy and drank thirstily. He had found that if he kept himself a little tipsy at all times, it was much easier to stay way down in this dank, eerie, underworld without fear of losing his mind. Soon enough his self-imposed exile would be over. Rich and victorious, he would emerge into the sunshine, return to New York, collect his beautiful flame-haired bride, strip her naked, and make love to her on a bed strewn with gold.

  Licking the brandy from his lips, Dane continued to toy with his golden curls and to daydream about his reconciliation with the lovely, innocent Elizabeth. But soon he tired of the game and wished, as he had on more than one occasion, that killing his business associate, Tom Lancaster, hadn’t been necessary. He missed Tom. Missed him terribly. Tom had been enjoyable company and an intelligent, witty, likable comrade.

  Dane sighed a little sadly as his thoughts went back to that unforgettable evening when he and Tom had found the gold. It was the week after they first discovered the caverns. They were exploring one of the many chambers and it came to be the hour when the bats awoke and flew en masse from the cave. One, a small gray-brown furry little creature that had apparently lost his way, darted into the chamber. The Mexican minions, slim Paco and the fat, walleyed Ortiz and their compadres quaked in fear at seeing the “winged creature.” When it swooped down and bit Dane on the cheek, drawing blood, they gasped and were frozen with terror.

  Tired and angered by the bat bite and the foolishness of the superstitious Mexicans, Dane decided it was time to quit for the day. But Tom, a few steps ahead of Dane, suddenly let out a low whistle of disbelief. His irritation forgotten, Dane hurried forth and his eyes widened as they beheld an unbelievable sight.

  There in a vast, dome-ceilinged natural amphitheater he stood up to his neck in gold! Transfixed, he held his pine torch high and stared. At the amphitheater’s center, gold ingots, stacked like cordwood, were surrounded by thirteen guarding skeletons chained to colorful stalagmites.

  Gold!

  Yards and yards of gold. Stacks and stacks. Tons and tons.

  The lost Grayson gold.

  Lifting his torch high, Dane couldn’t believe his ears when Tom Lancaster said they should leave the gold as they had found it. Leave the bodies and cave and never return. The legend of the lost Grayson gold was true. The skeletons proved it. They would die if they attempted to take the gold from the caverns. They’d wind up skeletons themselves.

  The frightened Mexicans were crossing themselves and shaking their heads in agreement with Tom. Deliriously happy but ever-resourceful, Dane Curtain, ignoring his partner, turned to face the big-eyed Mexicans.

  Holding the pine torch close, he touched the pinpoint of blood left by the bat’s bite. In a voice soft yet deadly cold, he said, “Only I am unafraid of the ‘winged creatures of the night.’ I am one of their number. I am their leader. Their master. And yours. Do you understand?”

  Trembling, the peasants could only nod, too frightened to speak.

  “My creatures and I feed on blood.” Dane licked his full, sensual lips until they glistened in the torchlight. “Human blood. I am all-powerful. Unless you obey me, I will unleash from their hiding place millions and millions of vampire bats. The very air will be black with their number.”

  Their terror was absolute. From that night the peasants did anything he asked of them. What he asked was that they transport the heavy gold bars topside to be stashed in a well-concealed hiding place until every last ingot was above earth.

  He sent Paco and Ortiz into villages to bring back liquor and food and women. They obeyed without question and were far too intimidated to consider telling anyone of the pale master who ruled an underground golden kingdom of winged night creatures.

  In time, Tom Lancaster came around to Dane’s way of thinking. There was no curse on the gold; such an idea was ridiculous. Why leave the gold untouched? It was theirs for the taking.

  Theirs? Dane didn’t like the sound of that. Patiently he pointed out to Tom that the claim was registered in his wife’s name. The gold belonged entirely to Mrs. Elizabeth Montbleau Curtin. And to her loving husband and heir, Dane Curtin.

  Dane had thought that was the end of it. But one night Dane had spent the evening entertaining a young woman in his private chambers, a pretty Mexican señorita his minions had brought to him from Malaga. When he tired of her, Dane got up, strapped a leather-sheathed dagger around his trim waist, swirled his long black loden cape around his naked body, and moved quietly through the shadowed passageways toward the amphitheater. There in the torchlight he caught the unsuspecting Tom staring at the gold.

  “What are you doing here?” Dane’s voice startled Tom.

  Tom turned, smiled, and said, “Nothing really. Couldn’t sleep is all.”

  “You’re stealing from me!”

  “Stealing?” Tom lifted his empty hands. “I’ve never stolen a penny in my life.”

  “Liar! You’re carrying away my gold while I sleep.”

  “You’re crazy, Curtin. Nuts! You’ve been down here too long. Look at yourself. Roaming around here in that black cape like some kind of—”

  “Be quiet!” Dane snarled, reaching inside his cape and drawing a jewel-handled dagger. “I am the Pale Master, damn you! I rule this underground kingdom and all that is in it! I will not have you stealing my gold!”

  “You are insane,” Tom said calmly. “I’m getting the hell out of here and …”

  Dane rushed forward and plunged the razor-sharp dagger into Tom’s stomach. A look of disbelief and horror in his eyes, Tom’s lips moved, but no sound came. Only a slight trickle of blood appeared at the left corner of his mouth. His hands clasped around the dagger’s hilt, Tom crumpled to his knees and died.

  “I didn’t want to do that,” Dane defended himself to the dead man. “You gave me no choice.”

  Dane pulled the dagger free of Tom’s body, wiped the blood off on his shirtfront, and resheathed the weapon. He stood looking down at the body for a long moment before going down on his knees beside it, his black cape billowing out around him.

  Dane’s hand went to Tom’s chin. He turned Tom’s head to one side and let his long, pale fingers flutter over the length of Tom’s exposed neck, from earlobe to collarbone. He smiled demonically, leaned down to the dead man, put his lips to Tom’s throat, opened his mouth wide and sank his sharp, white teeth into the warm flesh.

  Moments later Dane crossed the vast amphitheater, stepped out into the shadowy corridor, clapped his hands loudly three times, and waited impatiently as Paco and the walleyed Ortiz scurried forward. Dane motioned them to follow him.

  He led them directly to Tom’s body. They saw the teeth marks on Tom’s throat and shuddered.

  Dane ordered them to toss the body over the apron of the amphitheater stage into the chasm of blackness. Stricken with terror, the pair quickly obeyed.

  With Paco trembling uncontrollably and Ortiz biting on a knuckle, his bulging white walleye roaming wildly, they stood respectfully behind the pale master while the body of Tom Lancaster fell through the thick blackness.

  They never heard it hit bottom.

  29

  SHE HAD LEARNED HER lesson.

  Elizabeth was firmly resolved to stay away from West Quarternight. He was a cynical, amoral man to whom the concept of decency and honor meant nothing. He never regretted the sins of his yesterdays, nor intended to live better tomorrows. This life apparently meant nothing to him and he was surely headed for hell and damnation in the next.

  Well, he wasn’t going to take her along with him. She did care. She cared a great dea
l, about both this life and the one to follow. Morality and self-esteem were vital to her well-being in this life and the state of her immortal soul was important in the next, and she was in danger of losing both with Quarternight around. Any time she was with him, she felt an intense sexual excitement she could not deny. Her fear was as strong as her excitement.

  The solution to her predicament, however, was actually quite simple.

  Stay out of his way. Never again foolishly suppose that she could successfully play a joke on him. She could never get even. Never embarrass him the way he had embarrassed her. Never tempt him and tease him and bring him to his knees. It was virtually impossible to get the best of a man who cared about nothing and no one.

  Those were the thoughts in Elizabeth’s mind the next afternoon as she bumped along on the wagon seat beside Grady. She was vaguely aware that Grady was talking again—or still. She wasn’t sure which. But, for the past hour, she had heard nothing of what he said.

  Feeling half mean about her inattention, Elizabeth turned to look at the white-bearded scout. As Grady talked, he smiled—as usual. His blue eyes were twinkling, his face was ruddy with good health, and his lion’s mane of absolutely white hair appeared as he took off his sweat-stained Stetson and wiped his face on his forearm.

  “… and then after that, I was a lawmen for better than a year.” Grady, putting his hat back on, felt Elizabeth’s eyes and turned.

  Elizabeth smiled at him. “You were a policeman?”

  “Policeman, hell!” he said, frowning at her as though she were dim-witted. “This ain’t New York City, missy, and I wasn’t running around with no night stick! I was a New Mexico Ranger. I still got some souvenirs from them days.” He started smiling again. “Yep, I got, among other things, a couple of double-barreled shotguns, six Bowie knives, three Mexican daggers, and a couple of nail-studded clubs—all taken single-handedly from felons and outlaws.”