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Earlier a simple embrace had sent him to a darkened room where he had mourned next to a picture of his lost wife. I didn’t want to upset him further, but I also believed that he needed to move on. Probably because I wanted him to move on to me.
I stood, and Walker eyed me warily, as if he thought I would stomp my feet and order him to leave in my best Scarlett O’Hara voice. I might be Cherokee, but I was also Scottish and Southern. I could Scarlett with the best of them.
Instead, I pulled off my shirt, my skirt, my underwear; then I held out a hand for his. “You say you never get to go to the water?”
He shook his head mutely, his gaze wandering from my thick dark hair tumbling over my breasts to my waist, past where other dark hair swirled, all the way to my toes, which wiggled in the steadily cooling grass.
Mist tumbled from the mountains, skating across the tops of the trees, reflecting every shade of sunset. Soon it would settle over the water, going silver along with the moon. I wanted to bathe in that mist, sink into the creek, as Walker sank into me.
I flexed my fingers, and spellbound, he put his hand into mine.
Chapter 10
He would have walked into the water still wearing his pants if I hadn’t stopped him with a hand on his chest. The heat of his skin distracted me, the smoothness of it beneath my own, and I lifted both arms, running my palms across his pecs, over his shoulders, down his biceps.
The scent of him mingled with the scent of the trees, the mist, the water. I had to taste him or die, so I put my mouth where my hands had been, running my tongue from his collarbone to his nipple, then tracing the line of his ribs.
His fingers clenched in my hair, not pulling me away but holding me close. Slowly I straightened, cupping him through the thick material of his jeans, sliding my thumbnail down the zipper until he moaned.
“The water,” he said almost desperately.
“We’ll get there.” I flicked open his jeans and reached inside.
Hard and hot, thick and full, he pulsed against me. “Grace, I haven’t—”
I squeezed him once and he came, spurting against my belly. “You have,” I murmured, continuing to work him in my fist.
His face was beautiful in the fading light, his profile harsh yet familiar, eyes closed, mouth slightly open and relaxed. Leaning up, I brushed my lips against his, and his eyes opened. “I’m sorry,” he whispered.
“I’m not.” I’d followed my instincts, and they’d been right. He hadn’t done this in so long, he had no control. Now he would.
I waded in until the water reached my waist, then turned and waited for him. He stood on the bank, staring at me as if I were a water nymph emerging from the depths.
As I did every time I came to the water, I lifted my hands to the moon and said the words of my great-grandmother. When I lowered my arms, he still watched me.
“There is another world beneath our own,” he said. “It’s like this one in every way, except the seasons are opposite. Which is why the moving waters are warmer in winter and colder in summer than the air.”
I smiled, enjoying the way he told the tales he’d heard from the old ones whenever something reminded him of them.
“To reach the other place we walk the trails of the springs that come down the mountains. The doorway lies at their head where we can slide in and the beings there can slide out. You’re so beautiful, Grace, you seem from that other world.”
I shook my head, and my hair skated across the surface of the water, tossing droplets every which way.
As a child I’d been stared at and pointed at so much that by the time I’d grown into my legs, my mouth, my nose and teeth, I no longer believed I was anything but strange.
“I’m cold,” I said, as my nipples tightened, and my body seemed to come alive in a rush of blood just beneath my skin. “Warm me.”
Ian lost what remained of his clothes and stepped into the creek then immediately went below the surface, bobbing up, then dunking himself again. Once, twice, he kept at it until he’d doused himself seven times. Most every Cherokee ritual
involved the sacred number seven.
At last he burst from beneath and stayed there. “Before you come to the water you should fast.” He cast his eyes to the rising moon. “The ritual is performed at daybreak.”
I reached out and pulled him closer. “Forget about the old ways for a minute.”
I slipped my arms around his waist and licked a cool drop from his hot skin. At first I thought steam rose from his body, until I realized the mist skimmed across the surface of the creek like a snake, swirling around and over us.
“Grace,” he began. “I haven’t been with anyone...”
