by Tess LeSue
“Let’s put you to bed,” she suggested. “The night will pass quicker if you sleep.”
Susannah shook her head vigorously. “What if we blow away while we’re asleep?”
“I’ll stay up and keep watch,” Georgiana promised. She crawled over to the wall and arranged the bedding in the makeshift room Phin and Flip had built.
“I want to stay with you,” Susannah whined.
“It’s safer back here, darling,” Georgiana told her, hoping she was right. The wall of sacks should be safe enough, as it was only a single sack high; there was nothing to fall over, and the boys had done such a good job of wedging the sacks together that nothing looked likely to move. “I’ll be right here.”
“Can you sing to us?”
“You know she always falls asleep when she sings,” Flip protested, “and we need her to keep watch.”
“I don’t think I’ll fall asleep tonight,” Georgiana said dryly, “even if I sing.” She tucked them in. They huddled together, the puppy curled up amongst them. Woof was anxious and kept licking their faces and wriggling about. But he seemed to comfort them, and all four of them reached out to rest a hand on him.
“Do you think Princess is all right?” Susannah asked in a small voice.
“Princess is an Indian horse. He’s used to this weather,” a voice said from the back opening.
They all screamed.
“Oh my Lord, you scared me to death,” Georgiana said, pressing a hand to her heart.
It was Matt, peering in at them from the windy darkness. He was drenched, his hat limp, his face shining wet in the low lamplight.
He wasn’t with the whore. Georgiana went slack with relief. She’d been fighting images of him cozied up in a wagon just like this, but with a bunch of women.
“Just checking you’re all right.”
She wasn’t all right at all. She was terrified . . . but having to pretend otherwise for the sake of the children. She wanted to throw herself into his arms and bury her face against his neck.
He could tell. She saw it in his eyes, which went all soft the way they did when he was about to be kind to her.
The night around him glared white with lightning. A clear fork spat from the sky, seeming to hit the ground right behind him. She and the children screamed. “Get in here!” she squeaked. “Quick! Before you’re killed.”
There was another one of those gut-churningly loud cracks of thunder, and the rain started again.
“Get in!” Georgiana grabbed his sleeve and yanked.
“You need to untie the canvas,” he said mildly. “I’m a little too big to get through such a bitty hole.”
The night burst white again, and the wagon shook with the force of the accompanying thunder. Her fingers fumbled with the cords as she struggled to get the opening wider for him. He pulled himself through, flopping like a beached fish, spraying mud and water. His saddlebags were swollen and heavy, thudding to the boards as they fell from his shoulder.
“Sorry ’bout that,” he apologized.
The thunder sounded like it had split the earth beneath them.
“Close the back!” the children pleaded.
“No cause to worry,” Matt soothed them, calmly pulling the back tight and knotting it. The rain had intensified until it sounded like they were sitting right under a waterfall. Then it got even more violent.
“I reckon that might be hail,” he said mildly. “Thanks for inviting me in or I might have had my skull split open.”
“How can it be hail?” Georgiana asked. “It’s so hot!” Worse than hot, it was steamy in the wagon.
Matt shrugged. “I don’t know, but it is. It’s not uncommon out here in summer.”
“But the hail will kill Princess,” Susannah said, panicked.
Matt fixed her with a disappointed look. “Now, really, didn’t you listen when I told you Princess was an Indian pony? He’s lived his whole life on these plains. He knows what to do when it hails.”
“What does he do?” Susannah asked, her eyes huge.
He was so good with the children. Georgiana didn’t know how he did it, but when he was around, they were calmer, more settled. She watched them relax as they listened to him spin a story about how Indian ponies dug holes to hide in when it stormed.
“They do not!” Phin scoffed.
“You’re soaked through,” Georgiana interrupted. “You should get out of those clothes or you’ll catch your death.”
He shot her a look and she blushed.
“We’ll turn our backs and you can wrap yourself in a quilt,” she said primly.
“I should be going. There’s room in the chuck wagon for me.”
“But it’s hailing!”
“It’ll stop.”
“We don’t mind having you here,” she said, a little desperately. She really didn’t want to be alone again. Especially now the thunder was once more overhead and the canvas lit up with flashes of lightning. The wind sounded like a banshee. The thought of sitting here in the dark while it wailed in the depths of the night made her break out in a cold sweat. He saw her desperation and gave a little nod.
She gave him a rather shaky smile and held out a quilt for him to use. “Thank you,” she said.
“How do the horses dig holes?” Susannah pestered him, as they turned their backs to give him some privacy.
Georgiana could hear the slop of his wet clothes as he peeled them off.
“I don’t know, to be honest. I’ve never seen them do it. But I’ve seen the holes.”
“No, you haven’t!” Flip rolled his eyes.
“Sure, I have, and you have too.”
She heard the suck of his wet boots as he pulled them free and the sound of water running from his body as he wiped himself down with something. His shirt perhaps. It took all of Georgiana’s willpower not to steal a glance.
“I haven’t seen a horse hole,” Susannah said earnestly.
“Sure you have. Those big bowl-shaped holes in the mud, close by the river. We’ve been seeing them for months.”
“Those are buffalo wallows.” Phin was scornful.
“Well, sure.”
Georgiana heard the rustle of the quilt as he wrapped it around himself.
“The buffalo use the holes to wallow in when they find them.” He cleared his throat. “You can turn around now.”
Oh my. He was about the sexiest thing Georgiana had ever seen. His wet dark hair was pushed back from his face, and his eyelashes were spiky and damp. The opening of the quilt at his throat showed gleaming brown skin and the wet dark curls of his chest hair. His bare feet poked out from under the blanket. He had hairy toes. She had such an urge to reach over and stroke them.
But of course she didn’t. Instead, she kept her eyes averted, so he wouldn’t see her desire, and offered him a coffee. The kettle was cool now, but cold coffee was better than nothing. Then she busied herself draping his wet clothes over the sacks. There was no underwear, she noticed. Was he still wearing it? Or did he not wear underwear . . .
Best not follow that line of thought. She glanced at him, wrapped in the quilt, sitting on the buffalo skin she’d spread on the floor of the wagon. Oh my.
Now that he was here it didn’t seem so terrifying to feel the rattle and shake of the wagon, to hear the screech of the wind and the pounding of the rain and hail. It felt cozy inside their canvas shell as the thunder cracked and the lightning forked. If he had left, she would have been dying of terror. But now that he was here, the trembling in her limbs was caused by something other than fear.
She made him a sandwich and listened as he told the children tall tales about the magical properties of Indian ponies. She felt a shiver as she realized they were getting sleepy, and when they fell asleep behind their wall, she would be as good as alone with Matt Slater. Who was crammed into a
very small space with her. Naked.
24
“YOU KNOW WHAT we need?” Matt said huskily, when the last child had fallen asleep. The rain had let up, becoming a steady whisper, and the thunder rolled away again, although the lightning was still flashing behind the canvas hoop.
“What?” Georgiana had felt their familiar tension return the minute Wilby started snoring. The charge made her blood sing. She was aware of every inch of her body. Her skin prickled. It felt harder to breathe.
Matt smiled and reached for his saddlebags. As he moved his arm, the quilt fell away, revealing his chest. Whorls of dark hair circled his nipples, which were small and dusky and puckered. Her own nipples tightened in response, and she blushed. But who could blame her? She hadn’t been bedded for three years.
And she wasn’t about to be bedded now, she reminded herself sternly.
Shame. Look at how his muscles rippled as he moved. His arms were enormous. And the quilt was in serious danger of falling open as he rummaged around in his saddlebags. She could see his stomach flex. Oh my, it was hot in here.
“This,” he said triumphantly.
She’d forgotten what they were talking about and stared, confused, at the bottle he’d pulled out.
He took their coffee mugs and poured them each a splash. It was whiskey. She could smell it.
“I don’t know about you,” he said, handing her a mug and pulling the quilt back up high around him until all that lovely skin disappeared from view, “but I quite like storms.”
She was having trouble concentrating on what he was saying. They were in such close proximity that she could smell him. He smelled like rainwater and sweat and whiskey and coffee. She took a shaky sip of the whiskey. It burned all the way down.
“Here,” he said, passing her his mug to hold. He wriggled toward the back of the wagon and opened the canvas a few inches so they could see out. “It’s a shame not to get a look at the glory.” He patted the wagon floor next to him. “Come and take a look.”
She felt like pinching herself. Was this really happening? He’d spent most of the trip keeping out of arm’s reach, and now here he was, all but naked in her wagon, coaxing her to come closer. She wriggled closer before he could change his mind.
He took his mug back. They sat in silence, watching the vast nets of lightning splitting the sky. The darkness glared purple and white, and the warm, wet winds chased over the grassland and danced through the opening of the wagon. Now that Matt was beside her and she wasn’t so scared, she could see the elemental beauty of the storm. The air itself seemed to glow with trapped light, and the clouds rolled and churned above, in shades from the palest gray-violet to darkest charcoal black. The seed heads on the grasses flashed and bobbed, and threads of grass chased by on the wind.
“I ain’t never seen storms like the ones that happen out here,” he said softly, wrapping himself tighter and sipping at his whiskey. He had one arm out of the quilt, and Georgiana had a hard time not staring at it. His bicep was swollen with muscle. It flexed when he lifted the mug to his mouth.
“They don’t have storms like this in Oregon?” She tried to gather her thoughts enough to carry on a conversation.
“We have snowstorms,” he said, reaching into the cook pot and turning the lantern all the way down.
Oh my. “What are you doing?” Her voice trembled. What was he doing? It was pitch-dark in here now.
“It makes it easier to see the storm.”
Was it her imagination or did he inch a bit closer to her in the darkness?
There was a titanic crack overhead, and she jumped.
“That was close,” he said mildly.
It was more than close. It was right on top of them. The reverberations had barely diminished before it cracked again. It sounded like the world was splitting in two. The wind gusted, and it started raining again. She shivered.
“Is this how a tornado starts?” The thunder rumbled and echoed over the vast plains.
“Now, don’t go worrying about that,” he said, tossing back the rest of his whiskey. “There ain’t nothing we can do about it. But, no, this ain’t a tornado. Trust me, you’ll know if one hits.”
“You’ve been in one?”
“Close enough. This ain’t anything like it,” he reassured her. “If a tornado were heading for us, the wind would be so loud you couldn’t talk over it. As long as you can hear me, we’re all right.”
“Keep talking, then,” she said, laughing nervously.
He topped off their whiskey.
“Tell me about Oregon, the place where they don’t have tornadoes.” Georgiana tucked her legs up under her and watched the clouds flash with light. “You said you have snowstorms?”
“We have as much snow as you could want.” He wasn’t usually much of a talker, but just as he’d soothed the children with talk of magical digging ponies, now he soothed her with talk of Oregon. He painted a picture of his home in the foothills of the Cascades, of green summers spent fishing and trapping, of old forests and autumn leaves so bright you’d swear the trees were on fire. He told her about his brother Luke’s house, the one he’d built for a woman who refused to marry him, and lived in now with a woman who’d once dressed as a man. He described the long winters and great drifts of snow, the avalanches and the Christmas dance in the Utopia town hall, which had just been finished a year or two ago. He painted a picture so vivid she almost forgot where she was.
Or she would have, if he hadn’t been sitting beside her, smelling so good and radiating such warmth. The whiskey flowed through her, loosening her limbs, relaxing her guard. Oh, but she wanted to kiss him. She’d ceased watching the storm and watched him instead. Her eyes had grown used to the darkness, and she was close enough to see his face. His eyelashes were incredibly long, and they brushed his cheeks when he looked down. The groove in his cheek was so inviting she wanted to trace it with her fingertip.
“Why aren’t you married?” Oh my. Where had that come from? The whiskey had loosened her tongue as much as it had loosened the rest of her.
He glanced over at her. And, oh, if he had looked sexy before, he looked even more so with that bashful look on his face. He sucked on his lower lip and she almost groaned. Did he have any idea what he did to her?
“I don’t know why I never married,” he said shyly, shrugging. “I never met a girl I liked, I guess.”
“I suppose there aren’t many women out there in the wilderness.” She tried to tear her gaze away from his mouth.
“Truth be told, I ain’t too good with women.”
He was selling himself short there. He was plenty good, Georgiana thought, taking in his glistening golden-brown eyes and the sleek muscles of his arm. And it wasn’t even his looks. It was the way he took care of everybody. He didn’t even seem to know that he was doing it, but it was his natural instinct to step in when problems arose. Georgiana hadn’t missed how the women of the camp followed him with their eyes, how they smiled when he was near. Even the married ones.
They fell into silence again, listening to the beat of the wind on the canvas. After a minute, she heard him clear his throat. She shifted. The tension was unbearable.
“If you want to sleep, you can rest your head against my shoulder,” he said gruffly.
She didn’t want to sleep at all. She’d never felt less like sleep in her entire life. But she wanted to touch him, so she crept closer.
“Hold up a minute.” He adjusted his position until he had his back against the bag of coffee. She could hear the crunch of the beans under his weight. He stretched his legs out in front of him and they brushed against her. “That’s better. You can come sit here. It’ll be more comfortable.”
Her heart pounded as she scooted over beside him. She rested her back against the sack beside him and pulled her legs up to her chest. Then, gingerly, as though he might protest, she lay
her head against his shoulder. Her new position gave her a magnificent view. Not just of the night outside, but of the length of his body he exposed whenever he took a sip of whiskey. The long muscles running down the length of him, the hardness of his stomach, the line of dark hair that ran right down his belly, circling the dent of his navel, and then disappearing beneath the quilt, made her shiver. She itched to run her fingertips over that wiry, silky hair, over the velvet warmth of his skin.
Oh God. This was going to be the longest night of her life.
He hadn’t even touched her and she was wet. She ached. She was more aroused than Leonard had ever managed to make her, and they were barely even touching.
“Georgiana?”
She broke out in gooseflesh when he sighed her name. “Yes?” she squeaked. She’d say nothing but “yes,” no matter what he said. Her whole being was shouting yes, yes, yes. Just ask me: yes. Just touch me: yes.
“I think I made a mistake.”
He had? How? By wasting all these weeks not kissing her? Yes!
“I need to get my other arm out. If you go to sleep, it’ll go numb.”
What? Oh. She was lying on his arm. Her cheeks were burning as she sat up so he could free himself.
“Hold on.” She heard rustling. He was folding the quilt down. She could have pouted as he covered up that delicious dark line of hair and the lovely skin of his stomach. He freed both of his arms and tucked the quilt around his chest. “Do you need a blanket?” he asked.
No. No, she didn’t need a blanket. What she needed was him.
It was like running a high fever. She felt restless and irritable and . . . hungry. She was hungry. For him. Nothing but him. It was impossible to even think when he was close like this.