by Ann Jacobs
“Yes, I do. Deidre was acting crazy in town this afternoon. I imagine she’s taking her mom’s death mighty hard.” Karen thought about telling Buck about Deidre’s cowboy bodyguards beating the hell out of Jack Duval before Bye had stopped the fight, but she figured that wasn’t something that needed gossiping about.
She looked around the playroom but didn’t see either of the Bar C cowhands who’d been involved in the fight—not that they were likely to be members here. Jack wasn’t here, either. She imagined him home nursing his cut lip and assorted bruises, too sore to even think about dominating anybody tonight. “You want to tell me more about your great-grandpa?”
Buck shook his head. I can’t figure why you give a damn about somebody who’s been dead for close to fifty years, but I’ll tell you what I remember my pa telling me. The first Slade Oakley was a crazy old coot, always stirrin’ up trouble and getting himself tossed in jail even more than your pa does now when he goes on a tear. My ol’ man told me he used to keep a still out in the woods on the Rockin’ O and make his own white lightning. Said that probably was what killed him, but I imagine it was more like old age, ’cause he was more than a hundred years old when he died.”
“He must have passed away when my pop was a kid.” Apparently most Oakleys married late and had their children even later.
“Yeah. My old man was at least twenty-five years older than your pa. Your grandpa was no spring chicken when Pa was born. The old guy buried five wives, but he didn’t have a kid who lived until he was nearly sixty. My grandma was wife number three. Yours was number four or five, I’m not sure which.”
So their ancestor had managed to kill off five women before he’d finally died when her father had been around eighteen. That hardly surprised Karen. After all, she’d grown up in the squalor and filth that was the Oakley homestead. She doubted her grandpa had placed any more importance on taking care of his family than Pop had, taking care of her after her mom had passed away.
“Not a very admirable guy, was he?” No wonder folks looked down on the whole family. That still didn’t explain the reason for the violent hatred the Oakley men had shown toward the Cadens, but it went a long way toward justifying the community’s disdain for all Oakleys.
The door sprang open and Bye strode in, his expression stormy—frightening. “She’s gone. You don’t happen to have her in one of those rooms upstairs, do you, Buck?”
Buck went for the pistol he kept behind the bar, but Karen stepped in front of Bye. “Deidre isn’t here, Bye. I’ve been here talking with Buck since before six o’clock, and she hasn’t been here. If you want, you can go upstairs and look for her.” She watched Bye’s fury turn to despair. “We can call you if she should come in later.”
“I’m sorry, Buck. It was just a wild guess. She told me she intended to come here.” His shoulders slumped uncharacteristically. “Her car is gone. I’m afraid she may have run off with one of the cowhands. The old man has already notified the Texas Rangers to be on the lookout for her car, and he’s questioning the guys in the bunkhouse to find out if anybody’s missing.”
Karen had no doubt there would be hell to pay if Byron Caden caught any of his employees playing around with his only daughter. Then she remembered the fight this afternoon. “Bye, could she possibly be with Jack Duval? He hasn’t been here tonight, and he usually comes in every night unless he has to be in court early the next day.”
“Jack would be the last guy Deidre would go to. At least I think so. I’ll go check with him, though.”
Karen turned to Buck. “I’ll go with Bye. He’ll bring me back here to get my car.”
“It’s your funeral if Slade finds out you’re with her,” Buck told Bye. “Good luck finding Deidre. If she comes here I’ll give Karen a call.”
* * * * *
A half hour later, Karen and Bye left a sleepy Jack. Bye believed him when he said he hadn’t seen Deidre since he’d been forcibly tossed out of The Corral earlier. They drove through town, looking for Deidre’s red Miata or any other sign of her.
“I’m calling home. Maybe Four has found out where she’s gone.”
Karen pressed her hand against his thigh. “Good idea. I’ll keep quiet.”
“Dad, any clues as to where she may have gone?”
Four sounded distraught. “I think she may have taken one of the ranch hands with her. You remember the big guy, Travis? He’s not in the bunkhouse and most of his gear is gone.”
“Fuck.” Not three hours ago Bye had warned that son of a bitch to stay away from Deidre. “Is Frank there? He and Travis hung around together. They were the guys who took Deidre in to The Corral this afternoon.”
“Frank is here. I’ve got Diego working on him now, persuading him it’s in his best interest to tell me anything he knows. Where have you looked?”
Persuading? Bye almost laughed at the understatement. He knew all about the burly Bar C foreman’s preferred means of persuasion. Frank would be minced up like chopped liver if he didn’t spill whatever he knew, maybe even if he did. “I’ve been to The Corral and the Neon Lasso. I’ve driven all over Caden, which doesn’t cover a lot of territory. I even stopped and made sure she hadn’t gone to Jack—your other son if you recall. Deidre was pretty pissed at him for not letting her know they couldn’t ever get together, as soon as he’d found out.” Bye didn’t mention the fight. There was no need to get Four any more agitated than he already was. “Do you want me to see if I can catch Deidre?”
“I would if I had any idea where she might be headed. I called Cathy in Houston, and she’ll let me know if Deidre gets in touch with her. Damn it, it isn’t as though we have a huge family. She has to contact somebody. Come on home.”
Home was the last place Bye wanted to go. “I think I’ll drop in again at the Neon Lasso. This has been a hell of a day. I need to unwind.” It wasn’t sex he needed as much as more time with Karen at his side, understanding and sharing his fears for Deidre. “Call me if you get any information and want me to go chase after my sister. I’m afraid for her if she’s with Travis. I’ve always thought the guy was edgy as hell.”
“Go ahead and blame me for taking him on. I’m already blaming myself. It’s not easy to hire good help these days. When I find the bastard, though, he’s going to wish he was never born. Go on, unwind a little. I’ll see you when you get home.” Bye could imagine his father’s fists clenched, his face red with rage. Four sounded as stressed as Bye had ever heard him.
He looked over at Karen after shutting off the phone. “How’d you like to go to the line shack instead of the Neon Lasso? I’m not in a mood to play, and I doubt you are, either.” He hesitated, willing to give her the chance to refuse. When she nodded, he turned and headed onto a private road on the Bar C that led to the rustic cabin where she’d comforted him twice before.
* * * * *
A bright, full moon reflected off Bye’s silver Porsche as he helped Karen out of the car in front of the line shack and fit the key into the door. “Somebody’s likely to see your car here,” she said, a little unnerved by his casual attitude toward the possibility of them getting caught.
He bent and silenced her with a long, hard kiss. “Don’t worry. I’m not. Deidre is the one everybody on the Bar C will be trying to find tonight, and they’ve already combed over every inch of the ranch. Thank you for keeping me halfway sane while we were driving around, looking for her.”
“I was glad to go with you.” That was an understatement. Karen loved being with Bye, even though every time they were together they risked fueling the feud. That reminded her she wanted to ask him if he had any idea how the Cadens and Oakleys had managed to become mortal enemies. “Before you got to the Neon Lasso tonight, I was talking with Buck about the feud. He doesn’t seem to know anything about it, beyond the fact that our mutual grandfather was a drunk who made white lightning and hated everybody named Caden.”
“I asked my old man about it when we were out riding fences yesterday morning. He r
emembered your grandfather as a very old man who used to barge in at the big house when he was a little kid, brandishing a shotgun and making all sorts of threats.”
Karen already knew most of that. What she wanted to know was what had made her grandfather hate the Cadens that much. “Do you have any idea what started the feud in the first place?”
“From what Four said, it was apparently some sort of love triangle.” Karen listened as Bye recounted the very sketchy story his father had told him, about the oldest son of the first Caden landowner getting the first Oakley daughter pregnant but marrying another rancher’s daughter and leaving the Oakley girl to have his baby and die in childbirth. After that, the girl’s father had killed Luke and the feud had begun. “This all happened in 1883. Four took me and showed me Luke’s grave in the old Caden family cemetery. It’s not too far from here, close to the original homestead.”
Karen shook her head. A betrayal and a killing were pretty good reasons for two families to become enemies. For a hundred thirty years, though? “Surely there must have been other incidents over the years to keep the feud going so strong.”
“That’s all I know. Four wasn’t even sure that story hasn’t been exaggerated by time and retelling. He said he didn’t know anything about incidents that may have happened in the eighty years between then and the time he was around to see things firsthand. Luke’s story has gone through five generations at the Bar C, and I imagine it’s been embellished a lot in the telling.
“The old man doesn’t think much of your father, but I wouldn’t say he’s frothing at the mouth to get rid of any of you. As for me, I think holding on to a century-old feud is damn stupid.” When he smiled, Karen imagined how easily her ancestor must have been taken in by his, if Luke had looked anything like Bye. “What I’d like to do right now is show you just how much I want the Cadens and the Oakleys who’re here now to become good friends—and lovers. Come here and kiss me.”
“My pleasure.” The little bit of information Bye had just given her made her even more determined to piece together the whole story, but right now she wanted more to feel his hard, lean body on hers, his cock deep inside her. “Aren’t we both wearing too many clothes?”
“Yeah. We are.” He bent and kissed her long and deep, his tongue mimicking the sex act they both wanted. When he moved away he peeled off his shirt, his gaze never leaving her as she stripped off the blouse and skirt she hadn’t changed after work. “I like that slip. There’s something incredibly sexy about you in silk and lace. I can hardly wait to take it off you.”
He kicked off his boots but left his jeans on when he came back to her. Almost reverently, he cupped her breasts in both hands. “I love these. Let me play with them while you take off my pants.”
His belt buckle gave her a moment’s difficulty, but she managed to unfasten it and tackle the button on his jeans. He was already hard behind the zipper that she lowered slowly and carefully. “Hurry, baby.” He’d loosened her slip straps and slid the silky garment down her body, and now he was nuzzling the bare skin at the upper curve of her breasts. She worked frantically to get him naked while he primed her with gentle nips of his teeth, his hot breath on her skin—and searching hands that were sure but incredibly gentle where he explored.
God but she wanted him, more than she’d ever wanted a man before. She wanted not just a hot body but Bye Caden himself. She wanted him in her life, not just in her pussy, and that scared her shitless. In the heir of her family’s worst enemy she’d discovered the only lover who’d ever given her all she needed when they were alone. A lover who didn’t need to stimulate her with games of dominance or submission, one with whom she didn’t need to know curious eyes were watching her so she could come, or to prime her libido by watching others playing their sex games.
Sinking to her knees she dragged his jeans around his ankles as he helped by shoving his navy boxer briefs below his knees so she could drag them the rest of the way past his muscular calves to rest against the puddle of denim that she helped him kick off, leaving him delightfully naked except for socks that left him looking strangely vulnerable. She’d have taken his long, thick cock in her mouth but he dragged her to her feet.
“I’ve got to feel you, baby. All of you.” His calloused hands took a tantalizing path down her back to clasp her butt and hold her close to his heat and hardness. She felt moisture trickle down her inner thighs. She could hardly believe how he made her incredibly hot with his simplest touch. Even a smile and a hot look from those gorgeous ice-blue eyes could turn her on.
What she was feeling had to be love, or at least lust like nobody else had ever inspired in her, even with far greater effort. Karen tilted her head back so she could see Bye’s face and when she did he bent and claimed her mouth. His kiss was gentle, almost tentative, but it opened a floodgate of sensations that had her trembling in his embrace.
“Bedtime, baby,” he said, lifting her as though she weighed no more than a child and setting her on the narrow bed, which had been featuring prominently in her dreams since they’d first made love here. “Be right back.”
She watched him bend and grab his wallet from the pocket of his jeans. “I need to stash some condoms in this line shack where they’ll be handy when we need them.” Grinning, he stood and donned the protection, then lay beside her and took her in his arms. “Come to me, baby. Let’s make love.”
Not “let’s fuck”. I appreciate that. Karen hugged him close and wrapped one leg around his narrow waist, opening her pussy for his invasion. He was no longer just her playmate. She admitted it when he sank inside her. As stupid as it probably—definitely—was, she had taken Bye Caden as her lover.
“You’re mine.” His words, even though they came out in a husky whisper against her cheek, hinted that his feelings went deeper than lust. She wondered if that scared him half as much as it terrified her, or if he felt he could walk away without leaving the part of himself she sensed he was sharing with her.
“Yes.” She hadn’t intended to make that affirmation, which came out so softly she hoped he might have missed it as he began to move inside her, a slow loving as they lay side by side. It was as though they were equals, no longer playmates asserting dominance or feigning submission.
He broke the kiss and nuzzled her cheek. “I heard that, you know. I’m yours, too, if that makes you feel any better.” He held her closer, so close she felt his heart beat against her breasts and the moisture of his breath on her lips. His cock throbbed inside her pussy, as though impatient with the easy pace of their lovemaking.
“That part of me doesn’t seem to understand tenderness.” He laughed a little when his cock bucked hard inside her as he slowed his thrusts. “It hasn’t had a lot of practice, because there haven’t been a lot of times when I wanted more than just a hard fuck. I want it with you.”
She couldn’t hold back any longer. She had to tell him what was in her heart. “Bye, I’m falling in love with you.”
He buried himself inside her all the way and stilled his movement. With one hand he caressed her cheek while he looked into her eyes. “I know I love you. I want you more than I’ve ever wanted anything or anyone, and it nearly kills me to know I don’t dare go to your father and ask him to let me take you home.”
“Oh God. I’d die if anything happened to you because of me. Hush now, just love me tonight. I don’t want to think about tomorrow.”
The way she trembled in his arms told Bye how his admission had frightened her. The only way he knew to drive away a fear, like the one he’d momentarily experienced this morning when he’d considered damning the consequences and telling Four he wanted to marry Karen Oakley, was to make her quit thinking. He knew how to do that.
“On your back, baby. I’m gonna drive away everything out of your overactive brain except how good it feels for you to come with me inside you.”
“Yes. Make me come.” She rolled over on her back and spread her legs. “Fuck me as though you know this is the last chan
ce we’ll ever get.”
When he sank into her wet heat once more, she wrapped her long legs around his hips, as though she wanted him as far inside her as he could go. She was breathing hard, straining against his body. “You’re trying too hard, baby. Relax. It’s not a race. We’ve got all night.”
“I’ve… I have to come. Please help me.”
She tightened her vaginal muscles around him, milking him. He wasn’t going to last long if she kept it up, and he wanted her to come with him. He balanced his weight on one elbow and used the other to reach between them and stroke her clit. “Tell me what you need. Whatever it is, I’ll give it to you.”
“You. Just you.”
“You’ve got me.” Moving faster, harder, he slammed into her. She moved with him. Fuck, they were made for each other. When she sank her teeth into his shoulder he lost it. Pressure built in his balls.
He couldn’t wait. But he didn’t want it over. He wanted to stay inside her, draw out the pleasure. She let out a scream and tightened her hold on him.
Oh God. “I’m comin’ with you, sweetheart. Damn it, I love you.”
Her cunt tightened. That was it. He couldn’t hold back any longer. He let go the last remnants of self control and started coming in short, hot bursts that robbed him of the ability to speak…to think…to reason.
When he woke with Karen in his arms, his feet hanging off the too-short bed, Bye realized they’d slept too long. Seeing a picture-perfect sunrise framed in the small window across the room jolted him to full consciousness. And to the realization that no matter how awesome it felt to look down into her gorgeous, sleepy face, now wasn’t the time for them to go public with their feelings.
He sat up and shook Karen. “Get up, baby. Much as I’d like to stay here and hold you all day long, we’ve got to get you home.”