High Country Bride

by Linda Lael Miller

  “We can’t—not here—and I want to so much!”

  He laughed, cocked a thumb over his shoulder. “How about back there, then? Behind those trees?”

  She looked past his shoulder, assessing the stand of oak trees a hundred yards away. “I don’t know,” she said, feeling shy.“It might not be private enough.”

  He took her hand, led her away from the horse and toward the trees.“Let’s find out,” he said.

  She scrambled to keep up with his long strides. “Rafe—” she protested, but without significant conviction.

  The trees grew in a nearly perfect circle, and the center was like a little valley, tucked away under a canopy of green, chattering leaves. Emmeline looked back and saw only grass, rocks, and the faint sparkle of the creek. They might have been alone, the two of them, in a new Garden of Eden.

  Rafe kissed Emmeline thoroughly now, his hands on her hips, and both of them dropped to their knees on the soft ground. This, Emmeline knew, would be the time, the magical time when they would conceive a child together.

  She tilted her head back, gazing up at blue shards of sky, framed in oak leaves, as Rafe buried his face in her neck, at the same time unfastening the buttons of her shirtwaist, opening the camisole beneath. She gave herself up to pleasure, and to complete happiness, as he weighed her bare breasts in his hands, preparing them for his enjoyment, and for hers.

  She whimpered softly as he lowered her into the delicious grass, prickly against her back, which was naked except for the thin cloth of the camisole, and plunged her fingers into his hair, guiding him to her. As he suckled, first at one breast, and then at the other, he lifted her skirts, and gave a small chuckle of delighted surprise when he realized she wasn’t wearing any pantaloons.

  “Mrs. McKettrick,” he demanded, trying for a dour expression,“where are your britches?”

  She laughed, though her flesh was hot and her nipples were hard and she needed Rafe’s full and concentrated attentions in the worst way. “I got tired of always having to take them off, put them on, and take them off again. So I just left them behind when I got dressed this morning.”

  “Wench,” he said, grinning, and went back to what he’d been doing.

  Rafe was not a man to be hurried, no matter how urgent the pleas she uttered, and he had roused every part of Emmeline’s body and soul to a dangerous pitch before he finally parted her legs, opened his trousers, and pushed inside of her in a single, sky-splitting thrust.

  She cried out, clutching at his bac, his shoulders, his hips, by turns, wanting to drag him deeper inside her, and then still deeper. When she raised her head to nip at his earlobe, he lost control, at long last, and began to move in earnest.

  They strained together, flesh slick with perspiration, breaths shallow, hearts thrumming like horses’ hooves in the heat of a desperate race. They reached the arch of their passion at the same time, clinging as their bodies flexed in violent response, one to the other.

  Then they fell to the ground, still joined, both of them gasping, and waited for the world, thrown off its axis, to right itself. When it did, Rafe was the first to recover. He fixed his own clothes, and then Emmeline’s, before hauling her to her feet.

  “Do we look presentable?” she asked, still befogged with the echoes of all she and Rafe had just done together.

  He laughed, plucked a blade of grass from her hair, which was surely disheveled, since Rafe had been running his hands through it.“We look,” he said, glancing down at his rumpled shirt and trousers, “as if we’ve been making love on the ground.”

  “Oh, Lord,” Emmeline fussed, trying to straighten her hair.

  Rafe stopped her, drawing her back into his arms, and kissing her soundly. Things were already stirring inside her again when he drew back. “You’re especially beautiful at this moment,” he teased, “in a wanton sort of way.”

  She swatted at him. “You’d better get to work on that house,” she informed him, touching her abdomen with one hand. “I want this child we just conceived to be born in a proper bed.”

  His blue eyes widened, and the full impact of the love she bore him bludgeoned him from within, the way it so often did. “You really think there’s a baby?” he whispered, sounding awed.

  “I’d bet anything,” she told him, and slipped her arms around his neck.

  Emmeline wore Georgia McKettrick’s simple ivory wedding dress, altered to fit her, and a veil Becky had ordered all the way from Boston, the day she and Rafe were formally married. It was September, the leaves were just beginning to fall from the oak trees that had sheltered them while they made love, not just that once, but many times, within their circle. The house, though not completely finished, was fit to live in, and furnished with a bed, a shiny copper bathtub, and a kitchen table. The rest of the rooms would stand empty for a while, pending their honeymoon trip to California in the spring, but neither of them minded that. They had all they needed.

  The ceremony, performed by the circuit preacher, a somber-looking man dressed all in black, took place in the afternoon, with the sparkling creek for a backdrop. Angus and Concepcion were there, of course, as were Becky and John, and the enigmatic Holt, now mended good as new. The staff from the hotel attended, including Sister Mandy and Clive, an unlikely pair for a celebration if ever there was one. Kade was best man, handsome in his Sunday suit, but Jeb didn’t show up, even though the word had been put out weeks before that it was time he made his way home and let bygones be bygones.

  If the informal invitation had reached him, he’d chosen to stay away, and Emmeline knew that everyone was disappointed, most especially Angus. He hadn’t said anything to her, but Concepcion had confided that he walked the floor most nights, worrying that something had happened to his youngest son and blaming himself. He’d lost weight, and he spent an inordinate amount of time up on the hill, at Georgia’s gravesite.

  After the wedding, there was a reception at the main house, complete with cake and punch and a special surprise arranged by Becky and John. They’d sent for a photographer, and he’d come all the way from Tucson to take pictures of the bride and groom and all the guests. While they were celebrating, everybody talking at once, he’d gone out to his wagon to turn the plates into tintypes, by means of some mysterious chemical magic.

  Kade, his back especially straight, his countenance solemn, approached Emmeline while Rafe was being congratulated by all the cowboys, who took special delight in the cake and punch and other refreshments. “May I kiss the bride?” he asked quietly.

  She smiled.“Of course,” she said.

  He kissed her lightly, in the expected brotherly fashion, and then glanced over at Rafe. Holt looked on solemnly as the bridegroom enjoyed another round of congratulations, but he winked at Emmeline when she met his gaze. She laughed, and blushed a little.

  “I’ll be riding out soon,” Kade said, gaining her full attention. “Look after my brother, will you? And Pa, too, though I think Concepcion does a pretty good job of that.”

  “You’re leaving?” Emmeline whispered.“Why?”

  Kade sighed. “It isn’t like Jeb to hold a grudge this long,” he said. “I’m going looking for him.” He scowled, a McKettrick through and through. “And when I find him, I’m going to take a strip out of his hide, first thing.”

  Emmeline bit her lower lip. “We’ll miss you,” she said in all sincerity, but she knew Kade was doing the right thing. Angus was showing the strain, and the rest of them were feeling it, too. Something was very wrong where Jeb was concerned. “Do you have any idea where to start looking?”

  “I thought I’d check out that rumor about him and the widow woman first,” he allowed. “If that doesn’t pay off, I reckon I’ll make my way over to San Francisco. It would be just like my little brother to go over there and get himself shanghaied to China or some damn fool thing like that.”

  “Would you follow him that far?” Emmeline asked, with a little shudder, her eyes wide.“Even to China?”

 
“Yes,” Kade answered without hesitation. “He’s my brother.” He smiled and kissed her forehead. “I’ve already congratulated Rafe on being the luckiest man in the world,” he said,“so I’ll be going now.”

  Emmeline embraced her brother-in-law. “Be careful,” she said, “and don’t stay away too long, no matter what. Angus doesn’t need to be fretting himself about both you and Jeb.”

  Kade squeezed her hand. “Pa knows I’m leaving,” he said.“Unlike Jeb, I’ll be sending a letter whenever I get the chance.”

  “Goodbye,” Emmeline said.

  He merely smiled again, sadly this time, and walked away, disappearing through the doorway into the dining room. The kitchen was beyond, and the back door.

  Rafe came over to Emmeline and slipped an arm around her waist. He was frowning, and she knew he’d watched the exchange with Kade.“Wher’s he off to?” he asked.

  Emmeline was almost afraid to answer, lest Rafe take it into his head to join the search for Jeb and ride out after Kade. Alas, she and Rafe had agreed to keep no secrets from each other, and it was a bargain she meant to keep.

  “He means to find Jeb and bring him home,” she said.

  Rafe nodded thoughtfully, watching Kade out of sight. Holt, standing nearby, with a cup of punch in his hand, did the same.

  “I hope he finds him,” Rafe mused, “and soon. Pa’s fit to be tied, he’s so worried.”

  Emmeline nodded, looking after Kade, and Rafe took her hand. “Come along, Mrs. McKettrick,” he said. “I believe Concepcion is about to set out our wedding supper in the dining room, and I’m starved.” He wriggled hiseyebrows and spoke low and close to her ear.“I’ll be needing my strength,” he added. Then, taking her hand, he pulled her into the center of the celebration.

  It was after nightfall, and the stars were almost within reach, it seemed to Emmeline, when she and Rafe got into a buckboard and crossed the stream, headed for their first night in the new house.

  Outside the door, Rafe brought the team to a stop, lifted Emmeline down from the wagon seat, and carried her over the threshold. He set her on her feet in front of the large stone fireplace, where a nice blaze was crackling, and kissed her. Then, beaming, he reached into his coat pocket.

  “I’ve got something for you,” he said. He handed her a photographic likeness, taken that afternoon, in Angus’s parlor, of her and Rafe in their wedding clothes. Although the photographer had instructed them to present a sober countenance, they were both smiling, Rafe seated in a chair, Emmeline standing beside him, with one hand resting on his shoulder.

  She felt tears sting her eyes. “Oh, Rafe,” she whispered, caressing the image with the tip of one finger, touching first his face, and then her own.

  He reached up to the mantel, and took down the album he’d given her long since. “I reckon that’s just the picture to start it off with,” he said.

  She took the album, with OUR FAMILY inscribed on the front cover in gold, and opened it, placing the picture carefully inside, with the flower he’d picked up at the other house, on the mountaintop, in what was to be their bedroom.

  Indeed, they were a family now, she and Rafe.

  He reclaimed the album gently, and set it aside, back in its place on the mantel. Then he held out his arms to Emmeline, and she went into them without hesitation.

  This was home, not the fine new house rising around them, not the ranch reaching for miles in every direction, but Rafe’s embrace. This was where she belonged, where she rejoiced in being, where she was most truly herself.

  Epilogue

  Two weeks later

  EMMELINE STOOD IN FRONT of the Arizona Hotel with Sister Mandy at her side. Both of them watched, with a hand shading their eyes from the late afternoon sun, as two women got off the stagecoach. Even from that distance, Emmeline could tell they were at odds with each other, and she felt a funny little quiver of anticipation in the pit of her stomach.

  “Who do you suppose they are?” asked Sister Mandy, who was wary of strangers. “Their clothes are pretty fancy.”

  Indeed, both the new arrivals were well and fashionably dressed, if a mite dusty from the trip.

  “I think we’re about to find out,” Emmeline said as the women started toward the hotel, walking carefully apart. In the middle of the street, they stopped and fussed at each other, but they were still too far away for her to hear them clearly. “Looks like they mean to take rooms right here at the hotel.”

  Sister Mandy let out a low and very un-nunlike whistle through the small gap between her front teeth. “Loaded for bear,” she said. “I hope they don’t carry guns.”

  Emmeline spared her friend a brief, curious look, then turned her attention back to the approaching customers.

  “How do you do, ladies?” she said, smiling, as the women drew near. One snapped open a fan and fluttered it fussily beneath her chin. Both were quite pretty, though their temperaments were less appealing.

  “How do you do?” replied the taller one in an unfriendly tone. “Can you please tell me where to find Mr. Kade McKettrick?” she asked. “I’ve come all the way from Philadelphia. He and I are to be married.”

  A joyous giggle bubbled up into Emmeline’s throat and she swallowed it, though just in time.

  “That,” said the other woman, rummaging in the depths of her reticule, “is what you think, Sue Ellen Carruthers! I have letters to prove that I am Mr. McKettrick’s bride!”

  Emmeline and Sister Mandy exchanged glances, Emmeline’s amused, Sister Mandy’s—well—not amused. In fact, Emmeline would have sworn she saw a glimmer of tears in the young woman’s eyes.

  Sue Ellen Carruthers looked as though she would swing her handbag at her traveling companion’s head. “Nonsense!” she cried. “Kade McKettrick is marrying me!”

  “Oh, my,” Emmeline said, smiling. She could hardly wait to tell Rafe about this, and she’d have her chance soon enough. He’d be driving in from the ranch to collect her at any minute.“Brides to spare.”