The Complete Mackenzie Collection Read online

  “I don’t know how,” Mary blurted, still unable to believe this was happening.

  His voice was almost guttural. “Like this.” He took her mouth again, and this time she parted her lips immediately, eager to accept his tongue and feel that odd, surging pleasure once more. He moved his mouth over hers, molding her lips with fierce pleasure, teaching her how to return the pressure. His tongue touched hers again, and this time she responded shyly in kind, welcoming his small invasion with gentle touches of her own. She was too inexperienced to realize the symbolism of her acceptance, but he began to breathe harder and faster, and his kiss deepened, demanding even more of her.

  A frightening excitement exploded through her body, going beyond mere pleasure and becoming a hungry need. She was no longer cold at all, but burning inside as her heartbeat increased until her heart was banging against her ribs. So this was what he meant when he’d said she got him hot. He got her hot, too, and it stunned her to think he had felt this same restless yearning, this incredible wanting. She made a soft, unconscious sound and moved closer to him, not knowing how to control the sensations his experienced kisses had aroused.

  His hands tightened painfully on her waist, and a low, rough sound rumbled in his throat. Then he lifted her, pulled her closer, adjusted her hips against his and graphically demonstrated his response to her.

  She hadn’t known it could be like that. She hadn’t known that desire could burn so hot, could make her forget Aunt Ardith’s warnings about men and the nasty things they liked to do to women. Mary had quite sensibly decided that those things couldn’t be too nasty, or women wouldn’t put up with them, but at the same time she had never flirted or tried to attract a boyfriend. The men she had met at college and on the job had seemed normal, not slavering sex fiends; she was comfortable with men, and even considered some to be friends. It was just that she wasn’t sexy herself; no man had ever beaten down doors to go out with her, or even managed to accomplish the dialing of her telephone number, so her exposure to men hadn’t prepared her for the tightness of Wolf Mackenzie’s arms, the hunger of his kisses, or the hardness of his manhood pushing against the juncture of her thighs. Nor had she known that she could want more.

  Unconsciously she locked her arms around his neck and squirmed against him, tormented by increasing frustration. Her body was on fire, empty and aching and wanting all at once, and she didn’t have the experience to control it. The new sensations were a tidal wave, swamping her mind beneath the overload from her nerve endings.

  Wolf jerked his head back, his teeth locked as he relentlessly brought himself back under control. Black fire burned in his eyes as he looked down at her. His kisses had made her soft lips red and pouty, and delicate pink colored her translucent porcelain skin. Her eyes were heavy-lidded as she opened them and slowly met his gaze. Her pale brown hair had slipped completely out of its knot and tumbled silkily around her face and over her shoulders. Desire was on her face; she already looked tousled, as if he had done more than kiss her, and in his mind he had. She was light and delicate in his arms, but she had twisted against him with a hunger that matched his own.

  He could take her to bed now; she was that far gone, and he knew it. But when he did, it would be because she had consciously made the decision, not because she was so hot she didn’t know what she was doing. Her inexperience was obvious; he’d even had to teach her how to kiss—the thought stopped as abruptly as if he’d hit a mental wall, as he realized the full extent of her inexperience. Damn it, she was a virgin!

  The thought staggered him. She was looking at him now with those grayish blue eyes both innocent and questioning, languid with desire, as she waited for him to make the next move. She didn’t know what to do. Her arms were locked around his neck, her body pressed tightly to his, her legs opened slightly to allow him to nestle against her, and she was waiting for him because she didn’t have a clue how to proceed. She hadn’t even been kissed before. No man had touched those soft breasts, or taken her nipples in his mouth. No man had loved her at all before.

  He swallowed the lump that threatened to choke him, his eyes still locked with hers. “God Almighty, lady, that nearly got out of hand.”

  She blinked. “Did it?” Her tone was prim, the words clear, but the dazed, sleepy look was still in her eyes.

  Slowly, because he didn’t want to let her go, and gently, because he knew he had to, he let her body slip down his until she was standing on her feet again. She was innocent of the ramifications, but he wasn’t. He was Wolf Mackenzie, half-breed, and she was the schoolteacher. The good citizens of Ruth wouldn’t want her associating with him; she was in charge of their young people, with untold influence on their forming morals. No parents would want their impressionable daughter being taught by a woman who was having a wild fling with an Indian ex-con. Why, she might even entice their sons! His prison record could be accepted, but his Indian blood would never go away.

  So he had to let her go, no matter how much he wanted to take her to his bedroom and teach her all the things that went on between a man and a woman.

  Her arms were still around his neck, her fingers buried in the hair at his nape. She seemed incapable of movement. He reached up to take her wrists and draw her hands away from him.

  “I think I’ll come back later.”

  A new voice intruded in Mary’s dreamworld of newly discovered sensuality, and she jerked away, color burning her cheeks as she whirled to face the newcomer. A tall, dark-haired boy stood just inside the kitchen door, his hat in his hand. “Sorry, Dad. I didn’t mean to barge in.”

  Wolf stepped away from her. “Stay. She came to see you, anyway.”

  The boy looked at her quizzically. “You could have fooled me.”

  Wolf merely shrugged. “This is Miss Mary Potter, the new schoolteacher. Miss Potter, my son, Joe.”

  Even through her embarrassment, Mary was jolted that he would call her “Miss Potter” after the intimacy they had just shared. But he seemed so calm and controlled, as if it hadn’t affected him at all, while every nerve in her body was still jangling. She wanted to fling herself against him and give herself up to that encompassing fire.

  Instead she stood there, her arms stiffly at her sides while her face burned, and forced herself to look at Joe Mackenzie. He was the reason she was here, and she wouldn’t allow herself to forget it again. As her embarrassment faded, she saw that he was very like his father. Though he was only sixteen, he was already six feet tall and would likely match his father’s height, just as his broad young shoulders showed the promise of being as powerful. His face was a younger version of Wolf’s, as strong-boned and proud, the features precisely chiseled. He was calm and controlled, far too controlled for a sixteen-year-old, and his eyes, oddly, were pale, glittering blue. Those eyes held something in them, something untamed, as well as a sort of bitter acceptance and knowledge that made him old beyond his years. He was his father’s son.

  There was no way she could give up on him.

  She held out her hand to him. “I’d really like to talk to you, Joe.”

  His expression remained aloof, but he crossed the kitchen to shake her hand. “I don’t know why.”

  “You dropped out of school.”

  The statement hardly needed verification, but he nodded. Mary drew a deep breath. “May I ask why?”

  “There was nothing for me there.”

  She felt frustrated by the calm, flat statement, because she couldn’t sense any uncertainty in this unusual boy. As Wolf had said, Joe had made up his own mind and didn’t intend to change it. She tried to think of another way to approach him, but Wolf’s quiet, deep voice interrupted.

  “Miss Potter, you can finish talking after you get into some sensible clothes. Joe, don’t you have some old jeans that might be small enough to fit her?”

  To her astonishment, the boy looked her over with an experienced eye. “I think so. Maybe the ones I wore when I was ten.” For a moment amusement sparkled in his blue-diam