Despite the pain from the scrape, Catherine couldn’t believe the beautiful sight before her. There was a small meadow and beyond it a large lake surrounded by trees and wildflowers.
Jake rode out of the woods and stopped beside her.
“Are you all right?” he asked, and his gaze roamed over her face.
“I’m fine,” she insisted, her hand covering the wound. Tears had gathered in her eyes from the stinging sensation, but Catherine wasn’t about to mention it.
Jake shook his head impatiently. “Let me see,” he demanded.
“It’s nothing,” Catherine told him, but she didn’t move her hand.
“If it’s nothing, you’ll let me see it,” he reasoned. Leaning over, he reached for her hand.
With the little bit of skill she’d acquired, Catherine urged Flo to start walking again. “I’m okay,” she called over her shoulder. She was aware of Jake following her, and she led the way over to the lake. She stopped just short of it.
“Is it okay to let them drink?” she asked, looking in his direction.
He nodded sharply as he dismounted. He took the reins from Catherine and held Flo still while she got down from her horse, then turned the animals loose. With a determined expression he faced her.
“Let me see.”
“Jake—”
He ignored her protest and stepped closer, grasping her wrist before she had a chance to move away from him. Catherine caught her breath as Jake removed her hand from her neck.
A string of curse words flowed from Jake’s mouth as fluidly as hot lava out of a volcano. Several deep, red welts were striped across the side of her neck, and blood had begun to ooze from the worst one. “What in hell did you do to yourself?” He tilted her chin up and to the side, examining her without really expecting an answer.
“It’s nothing,” Catherine said again, but she winced when he touched her neck with the tip of his finger.
“Dammit,” Jake bit out, “I told you to watch out for the branches.”
“I was watching out for them—”
“Not very well,” Jake barked. “If you’d been paying attention to where you were going, this wouldn’t have happened.”
Catherine tried to shake his hand free from hers, but Jake didn’t let it go. “I only turned around for a moment,” she replied, justifying her actions. “I was going to ask you something.”
“Well, you should have been watching where you were going.” Jake began dragging her under the shade of the trees and Catherine tried to dig in her heels. Her strength proved no match for his.
“What are you doing?” she demanded, struggling to free his hold on her.
“You’re bleeding. The cuts need to be cleaned,” Jake told her, his tone stern. With his free hand he retrieved a canteen of water from his saddle.
“Here, give it to me. I can do it,” Catherine told him. At the moment she was more concerned about Jake’s hands on her than how much the cuts hurt.
Jake ignored her. At the edge of the lake he let her go. “Sit down,” he said, pointing to the base of a tree.
Catherine refused, and the look she gave him could have melted a snowman on a freezing winter’s day. “Jake—”
“Sit,” he ordered again.
Catherine shrugged her shoulders and gave up. She watched as Jake pulled a handkerchief from his pocket. He opened the canteen and poured water over the cloth, then twisted out the excess water. He dropped to his knees in front of her.
“Tilt your head up,” he instructed, then helped her with a finger under her chin.
To avoid a clash of minds, Catherine obeyed. However, as soon as the cold, wet cloth touched her neck, she yelped.
“It’s okay,” Jake said soothingly as he gently dabbed at Catherine’s neck, wiping away the traces of blood that had collected along the cut. He slid his other hand behind her head to hold her still. “It’s just cold.”
Catherine nodded. “It startled me,” she admitted, and she hoped he didn’t notice the huskiness of her tone. His nearness was disturbing enough without his hands on her. She held her breath, both wishing the moment over and wanting him to keep on touching her.
Jake leaned forward to get a closer look at the scrapes. “We’re going to have to clean this better when we get back and put some antiseptic on it,” he told her, then looked up. Their gazes collided. Heat radiated between them.
Catherine swallowed hard. She’d been dreading, yet anticipating this moment for weeks. There was no way she could pull away from Jake now. If he didn’t want her, it would be up to him to back off. She no longer had the strength to keep him at bay.
“Catie.”
His message was clear. Nothing more needed to be said. He wanted her and he let her know it, let her see the desire raging inside him. Yet he waited for what seemed like an eternity before he pressed closer.
He didn’t kiss her. Instead he lowered his mouth and touched his lips to the tender area of her neck, soothing it with his mouth in a way that a healing cream and a bandage could never do.
“Oh, Jake,” Catherine whispered, and the sensations he made her feel stole her breath. “Jake.” She put her hand against his cheek as his tongue slid out and caressed the sensitive area.
Without even thinking about it, Catherine went up on her knees and pressed her body against Jake’s. She wanted to guide his mouth to hers, but Jake made slow work of easing the pain from her cut and the result of his ministrations started a burning sensation in the deepest part of her.
Catherine had known it would come to this. She should have been strong enough to resist temptation. But she knew she and Jake shared something special. The years that had passed hadn’t changed that.
“Please.”
Jake answered her plea by covering her mouth with his. Pleasure soared through her, piercing every nerve along her spine, making her ache for so much more.
Catherine knew that being with Jake like this wasn’t in her best interest. A voice was whispering to her to stop things before they went too far, not to let Jake back into her heart. She was taking a chance on getting hurt by this man once again.
Jake drew Catherine against him, and she felt his hardness against her belly. All reasonable thought left her at that moment. He groaned low in his throat as their bodies touched intimately, her breasts grazing his chest. Catherine grasped his shoulders and held on to him as if she were in danger of falling off a cliff. His tongue slid into her mouth, searching, desperately seeking hers.
Catherine couldn’t breathe. Jake’s kisses seemed to overpower her. She pressed even closer, wanting to feel him against her, to feel the heat of his body seep into her.
Jake tugged at her shirt, yanking it up until he could slide his hand beneath it. He covered her breast, then molded it in his palm, stroking her, sending shafts of heat racing through her.
He pulled away from her, his gaze heavy-lidded with desire. He lowered his hands and locked them around her waist. “I want to see you,” he rasped. “Take off your shirt.”
His demand didn’t shock her. Catherine complied, wanting the same thing. She needed Jake’s touch, needed to feel his mouth on her breast. Her gaze remained fixed with his as she slowly unbuttoned her blouse, tantalizing him, enjoying the power she had over him. She slipped the last button free, then prolonged the moment of exposing herself to him by reaching behind her back and unsnapping her bra.
Her breasts were aching now, swelling, yearning to be stroked. Catherine slid her blouse off, then her bra. She put her hands beneath her breasts, lifting them, and Jake lowered his mouth to her, first touching each nipple briefly with a kiss, then grazing them with his teeth.
Catherine hissed as Jake finally settled his attention on one of her breasts. He licked her with his tongue, then sucked her into his mouth. She moaned deeply as his hand covered her other breast, massaging it, then swirling her nipple between his fingers.
“Jake.”
It was a cry for more, and Jake’s hands slid to he
r bottom, then intimately pressed her closer. “This is how much I want you, Catie,” he admitted. “Tell me you want the same thing,” he demanded.
“Yes,” she confessed.
Jake eased her down to the soft patch of grass beneath them and covered her body with his own. Catherine’s arms slid around his shoulders to the back of his head, holding his mouth to hers.
She trembled in his arms as his hands searched and discovered the softness of her body. Catherine gave herself to the moment, to the ecstasy of being touched by Jake, being intimate with him. Maybe she couldn’t have him forever, maybe that wasn’t to be, but she was with him now, and she was reveling in his lovemaking.
Jake slipped open the button of her jeans and slid the zipper down, exposing her white silk panties. Catherine lifted her hips as he tugged her pants from beneath her. With ease, Jake removed her shoes, then the remainder of her clothing.
Catherine lay exposed before him, and Jake made quick work of shedding his clothes before lying beside her in the grass. He couldn’t believe she was there with him. He ran a finger across her cheek to the base of her throat. She lifted her head, her eyes searching his as he lowered his hand to cup her breast.
Her eyes closed momentarily, then opened again as his hand slid lower, across her abdomen, then lower still. Her hips arched when he touched the core of her, and Jake took his time learning every inch of her body once again.
“Oh, Jake.” She whispered his name between her teeth. Her hand slid behind his neck, drawing his mouth to hers. “Kiss me, Jake.”
He lowered his head and gently touched her lips, then his mouth rested on hers, feasted on hers, until they were both breathing heavily.
Jake slid over her, his body hard and ready, aching to feel her warmth, to be inside her. Catie opened her legs for him, and Jake slid into her.
“Ah, Catie,” he whispered, sinking deeper as the words left his mouth. “You feel so good.” His lips nudged hers as his hips rocked against her. Catherine moaned low in her throat as she returned his kisses.
She spread her legs wider, and Jake gave her more of himself, pushing against her hips. His hands grasped her buttocks, lifting her to him, giving him deeper access.
“Yes,” Jake grated, his teeth clenched. “Take all of me, Catie.” His hips rocked faster, and he was rewarded by the glazed look in her eyes as her pleasure came to her.
“Oh, Jake…Jake.”
Jake lost control, pumping his hips harder and faster until he couldn’t think, couldn’t comprehend anything except the gratification of being with Catie, of loving her body. He felt himself slipping into a void, and a low growl came from deep inside him as he slipped over the brink of reality into a world of wonder and fulfillment.
In the aftermath, as he lay naked with Catie, Jake could remember many times when he’d made love to this woman. His heart seemed heavy, constricted by the thoughts rushing at him.
What was he thinking, letting things go this far with Catie? He closed his eyes and admonished himself with a few silent words.
“We always were good together, weren’t we, Jake?” Catherine whispered.
Jake pulled away and looked down at her. “Catie—”
“Don’t you dare apologize, Jake McCall,” she warned him, her tone suddenly curt. “Neither of us planned on this, but I’m perfectly capable of handling an affair—”
His sharp look stopped her words. An affair. Jake should have been pleased that she was looking at the situation so pragmatically. Apparently she wasn’t looking for a commitment. Well, neither was he, so he should have felt relief instead of this odd sense of irritation.
Hell, she was right. They’d always been good in bed.
“I don’t know what it is about you, Catie. I take one look at you and my sanity disappears.”
He said it grudgingly, already regretting letting Catherine a little closer to his heart. Turning his back to her, he gathered their clothing and handed Catherine hers. He dressed, then watched as Catie finished, her fingers fumbling with the buttons on her blouse.
She was beautiful, bewitching, and Jake knew he was in trouble. His heart thudded heavily in his chest, an ache he couldn’t quite identify. He had a gut feeling this was going to end badly…for both of them. Nothing good could come out of them having an affair. Jake had nothing to offer Catie.
That they were still physically attracted to each other didn’t mean anything. They only had Matthew in common. They lived different lives in different cities. In a few weeks, Jake reminded himself, Catie would be leaving to go home.
Catherine finished dressing and turned toward him, brushing her hair away from her face with her fingertips. “What did happen, Jake?” she asked quietly.
Jake knew what she was asking. He didn’t have an answer for her now, any more than he had the first time they talked. “You know what happened.” He said it more brusquely than he intended. He hadn’t thought about compromising the situation between them. He should have been thinking about Matthew instead of his mother.
Catie didn’t know everything about him, and to Jake’s way of thinking she didn’t need to. She was still young, still had the chance to find someone to love, get married and have more children. Something Jake couldn’t give her.
“You never called me.”
Jake buckled his belt, then rested his hands on his hips. “I meant to. I swear I did. There was just so much to do when I got home.” He shook his head. “Catie, if I had known about Matthew, I’d have found some way to be there for you.” He briefly thought of mentioning the accident, then stopped himself. He just couldn’t talk about it with her.
She looked as if she wanted to believe him, but still had doubts. Jake didn’t know what to say to convince her. Apparently, she wanted to believe the worst about him. He didn’t pretend to know what it had been like for her, raising Matthew on her own.
“How did your parents take it?” he asked, raising a brow in question. “Were they upset when you told them?”
“What do you think?” Catherine answered, her defensive tone giving clue as to her parents’ reaction. She tucked her blouse into her pants, then walked to the edge of the lake, away from him.
Jake followed her. “Tell me what happened,” he said.
“Oh, you don’t want to know.” Catherine kept her back to him.
Jake reached out to touch her shoulder, then stopped himself. Just the thought of touching her made him hard, made him want to strip her clothes off and make love to her again. She’d said she could handle an affair. It crossed Jake’s mind to wonder if he could.
“Tell me, Catie.”
She turned to confront him, and all the sorrow of the past was in her haunted green eyes. “They disowned me.”
It took a moment before he absorbed the shock of her words. “What?” Jake grated, anger pulling at him.
She twisted her hands back and forth, locking her fingers together, then separating them again. “I worried for days about how to tell them. I knew they’d be upset, that they’d be disappointed.” She took a deep breath, as if she needed it to go on.
“What did they say?” Jake prompted when she stopped speaking.
“I waited as long as I could before telling them. Finally, when I got the letter from your attorney, I realized that you weren’t going to call me.” She sniffed, then ran a hand through her hair. “As much as I hated to admit it, I wanted their support. I needed someone to listen, to reassure me that everything was going to work out.”
She trembled violently, her body visibly shaking. She held her arms in an effort to control herself. “My father called me a slut. He said I had no morals and that God was punishing me for being weak.”
“Oh, Catie, I’m sorry.” Jake reached toward her, but before he could touch her, she shrank away from him.
“I wanted so much for them to be there for me.” Tears came to her eyes and still she held them back. “Of course I expected them to be upset. I knew my pregnancy would be shocking, but in my h
eart I’d hoped and prayed that my parents would love me, that they would want to help me.” She sobbed then, the tears finally breaking through. Her shoulders slumped as she raised her hand to her face, covering it.
“Catie, come here.” Jake reached for her again, and this time she didn’t resist. He pulled her into his embrace and wrapped his arms around her, holding her against him, rubbing her back with his palm. “I’m so sorry you had to go through that on your own.”
“Jake, they wouldn’t even let me see my sisters,” she told him on a ragged breath. “They said I was a bad influence, that I didn’t deserve to ever talk to them again.” The tears in her throat stopped her from speaking.
Jake had never met Catie’s parents, but from what she’d told him, they were strict, especially her father. He remembered being in the room when Catie talked with her father on the phone, and the times she’d cried afterward.
“Hush, Catie. They can’t hurt you now.”
Catherine cried harder as she stood in his arms. All of the years of hurt and pain came rushing at her. She allowed herself the luxury of being held by Jake, of feeling his powerful arms surround her with warmth and strength, something she’d needed for so long.
Finally she sniffed and looked up at him, her eyes swollen with tears. “Bethany and Sarah would be in their twenties now,” she commented, her tone filled with sadness. “I wanted so much to talk to them, to tell them that I loved them, but my father made me leave that day before they came home from school.”
Jake tightened his arms around her. “I know that must have hurt you.”
Catherine shook her head. “I never saw them again. I’ve written them letters, but they’ve never answered them. I don’t know if they don’t want to see me or if my father never let them have my letters. After a while the envelopes started coming back unopened. My parents must have moved away.”
Jake ran his hand up to the back of her neck, then his palm cupped her chin, lifting it so he could see her face. “I’d give anything to be able to go back and change things for you. I want you to believe I would never have let you go through that on your own.”
A Cowboy, a Bride & a Wedding Vow Page 12