And there was the matter of Richard Todd, still unresolved. He could see her weighing things, her eyes narrowed.

"Elizabeth. Is that good enough for you?" he repeated.

"Yes," she said grudgingly. "It is."

"Well, then." Nathaniel nodded. "Then this is what we've got to do. We've got to keep Todd away from Johnstown—never mind how, I'll work that out later." Reluctantly, he stepped back a bit from her. "Now maybe we better talk about how we'll meet up, before I send you home."

"Oh," Elizabeth said, feeling suddenly deflated. She tried hard to hide her disappointment, tried not to look at him, his face, his mouth. And failed miserably. She bristled with the need to put her hands on him and still she didn't dare.

She said, "I've just spent eight weeks being pleasant to Richard Todd. Which I didn't enjoy, though you seem to think I did. I thought you and I would have .. . a little time together."

There, she thought, blushing and cursing herself for it. I've as much as dared him to kiss me, and what if he won't? What if he doesn't? There was a need in her that she couldn't name and didn't know how to tell him about, but she knew she must touch him, must have him touch her, or simply die.

He saw all this, and it made him glad and it frightened him, too. "Elizabeth," he whispered, catching her up tight against him. "By Christ, don't you think I know how long it's been? But if I start, if we start—" And then he paused to kiss her, anyway, because she was so close and there was her smell that undid him, dried flowers and ink and her woman smell, and there was nothing more in the world he could think of doing. A rough kiss that drew from Elizabeth a sigh like the wind in the trees. Nathaniel pulled her up tighter against him and went on kissing her for a long time, until he could force himself to stop

He buried his face in her neck, inhaling her scent. "If we start this now—"

She said, "It's already started." And she was right, he knew it; it was started and it couldn't be stopped. There was nothing to do but to draw her down into the pelts, reaching behind her to snap a cord with a jerk of his wrist so that she could lie there in a jumble of fisher fur as dark and rich as her hair while he kissed her mouth, and kissed it again, and touched her, her face, her throat, letting his mouth follow, his body tense with purpose even while hers softened, drawing him in.

Her eyes glowed in the half light as he untied her cloak and tugged it out from under her. Concentrating on her face, Nathaniel pulled free the lace kerchief tucked into her bodice, drawing it over her skin. He dropped it behind himself and then, slowly, ran his knuckles over the swell of her breasts and down her body, half fearing that she would protest. But instead there was only the way her flesh rose to him, and the sound of her indrawn breath. She touched him then. Slid her hand into the open throat of his shirt to draw him down into a kiss deep enough to put an end to his indecision.

There were buttons and ties and hooks to be dealt with between long kisses. She helped him with her own clothes until only her shift remained, and then watched with a little frown of concentration as he sat back on his heels to pull his shirt over his head. He felt her hands on him while his face was still caught inside, her tentative fingers touching the Kahnyen'keháka tattoo that circled his chest, tracing faded scars. When he had stretched out next to her again she found the one she wanted, a puckered bullet wound on his shoulder. She lifted her head to press her lips to it, the shy touch of her tongue moving him to hastiness. He drew her close.

"Is this what you want?" he asked, his cupped hands pressing her buttocks through thin muslin, seeing that she did want it in her face and the way she moved into his hands. But he needed to hear her say so.

She surprised him. "It's you I want," she said clearly. "Not Richard Todd. You." And he understood that he had underestimated her frustration and anger and pure iron will.

He pushed the shift off her shoulders, helped her turn this way and that until she was free of it, her body white against the dark fur. The luxury of her breasts, firm and round and full, struck at him like a fist.

"Holy God," he muttered, burying his face in the curve of her throat, his hands clenching on her back. He could feel all her furious determination draining away to sudden uncertainty.

"Are you—is everything—all right?" she asked hoarsely.

Nathaniel captured her bare shoulders and leaned over her, his blood leaping at the feel of her softness against his chest. That she would need to ask such a question, that she would have no idea of her own beauty or of the value of what she offered him.

"Elizabeth," he said, resting his forehead on hers. "You are the finest thing I've ever seen. But it's been a good long while, and I'm having a hard time minding my self—control."

She smiled then. "Nobody has asked you to," she whispered, and she blushed, the color seeping down her neck and over her chest.

He followed her blush, forcing himself to slow down and start the whole game anew, light kisses and then more demanding ones while he explored her. With an open palm he drew circles over her nipple until she gasped, her fingers curling hard around his arms. When he found her breast with his mouth she cried out for the first time, arching up to him while he suckled. Her flesh swelling against his tongue, Nathaniel felt his whole body shudder with the pleasure of it.

She had broken out in a fine sweat; he licked it from between her breasts and her throat, working his way up to claim her mouth in a kiss as heavy and demanding as the ridge of flesh he pressed against her hip. As he rocked against her, hip to hip and tongue to tongue, he ran a finger up her thigh to touch her heat for the first time.