Bride of the Wolf

by Susan Krinard

  Rachel searched his eyes, wondering how she could ever have thought that Holden Renshaw was a villain. In the past few hours he had become a different man. There was no disgust in his face as he held her now, no contempt, no judgment. He didn’t regard her with lust in his heart. He was comforting her just as he had when she had endangered Gordie’s life with her carelessness, as if she deserved such comfort. Such acceptance.

  It could not be real. In a moment he would walk away. She could make him walk away.

  “Most men would consider me a whore,” she said, giving the word a bitter edge. “I thought I had changed, but I haven’t. I haven’t learned from my mistakes.”

  “Rachel—”

  “If not for Jed and Gordie, you would have been glad to accept an invitation to my bed, wouldn’t you? It would have been my sin, not yours.”

  His grip on her arms loosened, and she broke free, stepping back until her shoes splashed in the creek. “I lied to Jed. I didn’t tell him about the baby, or that my own aunt threw me into the street for debauchery. Do you suppose he would still want me if he knew?”

  Rachel could count on one hand the number of times she had observed any sort of vulnerability in Holden Renshaw, but she saw it now in the movement of his throat and the bewilderment in his eyes.

  He doesn’t know what to say. He can’t deny any of it. He can’t tell me it will be all right, that Jed will understand.

  “He never knew me,” she said. “He wanted a good woman, a companion who didn’t expect anything more than a stable home and wholesome work. What he got was—” The words caught on her tongue, and she shook her head wildly.

  He lunged toward her and caught her chin in his strong, callused fingers. “You think Jed’s perfect, Rachel? He’s not.”

  Now he was angry. At Jed? She had come to believe that his loyalty to his employer was real, not some bid for power as Sean had claimed, but that anger…

  Water had begun to leak into Rachel’s boots. She tried to move past Holden, but he put his hands around her waist and lifted her onto the bank. She walked quickly toward Gordie’s crate as soon as her heels touched firm ground.

  Miraculously, the baby had slept through the commotion, his face untroubled, innocence unsullied. Rachel lowered herself to the blanket. There were still things she had to explain before he woke. Holden had to know all of it, even though she could see no hope.

  “I didn’t lie only to Jed, you know,” she said, silently counting Gordie’s gentle breaths. “I lied to everyone when I came to Javelina. You see, I never married Jed, in Ohio or anywhere else.”

  Perhaps it was odd to expect outrage from him now, given what she had already revealed. But he didn’t speak again until he was standing on the other side of the crate, looking down at Gordie with that strange, vulnerable expression still on his face.

  “I knew you wasn’t married,” he said.

  Gordie yawned, and Rachel held very still until she was sure he was sleeping again. “You knew?” she said numbly.

  “It was clear from the letters you sent Jed.”

  The letters that revealed every dream she had come to cherish since she had lost Timothy, dreams she had never shared with anyone but the man she was to marry.

  “You knew,” she said thickly, “and yet you asked those questions, tried to make me—”

  He dropped into a crouch, balancing on his toes with the careless grace that never ceased to fascinate her. “I was mad for a while,” he said, “but I understand why you had to do it.”

  Rachel believed him. His very past spoke for his sincerity. But if he had felt that way, why hadn’t he revealed his knowledge of her deception before?

  Of course. Gordie. He’d treated her as a necessary evil when she’d first arrived at Dog Creek so that she could care for the baby, and he had continued to leave Gordie in her care even after he had briefly suggested she give the baby up to Lucia. He must have believed she would leave if her secret was exposed.

  Was there any sense in thinking that his concern for Gordie was not his only reason for letting her think he’d believed her?

  No. No sense at all. Yet if it was all for Gordie’s sake, why did he sometimes behave as if he had only a passing interest in what happened to the boy? Why had he given her the cherished privilege of naming him? Why had he chided her for thinking of giving up when she had declared herself unfit to care for him?

  She could think of only one reason in the world, the very reason she had almost dismissed only a few days ago. I don’t much care for folk who throw their kids away like rotten meat, he’d once told her. It was so clear, and yet she was as much in the dark as ever. All the things she had learned from his story of his youth, and she still didn’t understand why he would deny his own son.

  Or why he would keep thrusting Gordie into her arms, as if he…

  Hope for nothing. Believe nothing. Your heart can never be trusted again.

  Rachel gazed past Holden’s worried face. Why should she believe she had any pride left, let alone a future remotely like the one she had so foolishly envisioned?

  “I told you I loved Jed,” she said, her voice sounding remote and indifferent even to her own ears. “That was also a lie. I did not believe myself capable of that kind of love anymore.”

  She held her breath, but he said nothing, and he was no longer looking at her when she glanced at his face.

  “I know now,” she said dully, “that I can never marry Jed. Not only because he is not likely to want me when he knows how I have misled him, but because I have learned that love is essential to me after all.”

  And if Holden Renshaw could not love, if the only affection he truly understood was the little he spared for Gordie, she would never marry at all.

  Holden’s boots scraped the ground, stirring last year’s fallen leaves. “You deserve to be happy, Rachel,” he said.

  If she once looked into his eyes, she would begin to weep again, and she had had far too much of weeping. “I thank you for that. But no one can be responsible for another person’s mistakes or expectations. I have chosen my own path.”

  “No,” he said. “Someone else chose it for you.”

  “Is that really what you believe, Holden? That we do not control our own destinies?”

  He scraped up a handful of soil and weighed it in his palm. “There ain’t no such thing as destiny,” he said, turning his hand over to let the dirt fall. “Just fightin’ to survive.”

  Once, Rachel had believed the same. But something strange happened then, a peculiar, uncanny sensation of lightness that seeped up inside her like clear water rising through a poisonous murk. An inexplicable peace drove the despair from her mind and heart. She had but one responsibility now, and that was to Gordie. Even if Holden could not or would not acknowledge him, the child would never be abandoned. She would stay on at Dog Creek as long as necessary to make certain that he was adopted by loving parents, whether Jed returned today or in a year. If Holden loved Gordie even a little, he would help see that it was done.

  She was free to make her own choices again, based not on society’s dictates or the bonds of her own past, but upon the deepest desires of her body. Holden knew she had been reviled for getting with child out of wedlock. He didn’t care. He, of all men, saw her, not a hussy who had failed to live as a good woman should. He had given her the only real compliment he knew how to give. Now that she had no dreams to defend, she carried no burdens. No pride to maintain, no use for a mask of prudence and respectability. No expectations, no need to do anything but live in this moment.

  She held out her hand. Holden didn’t see it at first. He was staring past the little grove of oaks, beyond the stretch of green that marked the spring, and out to the bleakness of the parched desert he called home.

  “Holden,” she said.

  His gaze moved to hers as if she had jerked him by a chain bound tightly around his neck. His eyes were wide and strange, like those of an animal driven into a corner. He scarcely seemed to
be breathing at all. But when she touched his hand, his fingers uncurled and a deep, shuddering sigh released all the tension in his unyielding frame. When she removed his hat and leaned forward on her knees to kiss him, she felt as if she were releasing them both from a cage built of empty fears and hollow rage.

  Holden sprang free like a tiger escaping a lifetime of captivity, dragging her into his arms, hip to hip and thigh to thigh. She opened her mouth, welcoming the thrust of his tongue. His hands, spread across her back, moved down to cup her bottom, pulling her harder against him. His arousal seemed to burn through her skirts. Her breasts, trapped in their restraints of chemise and corset and bodice, begged for his caresses, and the ache between her thighs flared into something like pain.

  She cried out in protest when he let her go, but he was far from finished. His fingers fumbled at the tiny hooks of her bodice, and she pushed his hands out of the way to finish the job herself. The edges fell open, and Heath pushed it away from her breasts and worked it over her shoulders until she was compelled to intervene again and remove it entirely.

  But the corset still stood in the way. Breathing fast, she tried to focus her attention on unfastening the busk, refusing Holden’s eager assistance. When she was done, she shrugged out of the stiff garment, which soon lay beside the bodice on the blanket behind her.

  His hands were on her as soon as she was free, cupping her breasts through her chemise, working feverishly to uncover her naked flesh. She unbuttoned the placket of the chemise and pulled it over her head. Holden lifted her, one hand at her back and one supporting her bottom, until her breasts were at the perfect height to accommodate his mouth.

  Then his lips were on her breasts, his tongue following a moment later with hungry little flicks that pulled her nipples into hard, aching peaks. She flung back her head and gave herself over to the wanton inside her, moaning and lacing her fingers through his hair as he suckled her, first one breast and then the other. He was not gentle, but she wanted nothing of gentleness after so long a wait. He kissed her again, almost savagely, and pushed her down on her back.

  At last, the wanton cried. At last!

  She tugged at the heavy folds of her skirts as Holden pushed them up over her ankles and knees and thighs. The baggy boy’s trousers underneath were a minor impediment, quickly disposed of and tossed aside.

  Rachel’s only thought then was to feel the hard length of Holden’s shaft inside her, thrusting deep, filling the empty, aching space inside with his heat and power. Nothing else mattered, not even the fact that she might never feel such sensations again.

  But he didn’t lie over her and take her as she wanted so desperately. She felt the brush of warm air between her thighs, and then his mouth was there, moving almost gently now, and his tongue was gliding over those lips, licking and teasing until a gush of wetness spilled out, wetness he lapped up as if it were honey. He circled his tongue around and around until she was aching and thrust inside.

  Rachel cried out, arching upward as he filled her, not as she had wanted, but so wonderfully that she forgot she had ever desired anything else. Her body began to quiver as he withdrew and teased her nub until she felt her body release with joyful ecstasy.

  Closing her eyes, she lay still, savoring the deep, delicious throbbing and the peace that came after. Holden was pulling her skirts down, covering her again, hiding the vulnerability she had so willingly exposed.

  And then he was standing, walking away, leaving her.

  As she understood now that she had to leave. Because she had made her choice. Because she had betrayed Jed in every way possible. And because there would be no other time like this, no tender reprise, no declarations of devotion.

  She had not expected any of those things. But hope, that merciless enemy, would not be silenced.

  Until Holden walked away.

  You deserve to be happy, he’d said. But not at Dog Creek. Not with him.

  She sat up and began to pull on her clothes, chemise and corset and bodice. She rose and put on the trousers, buttoning them carefully. Then she knelt beside Gordie’s crate. He was awake now, amusing himself with his own tiny fist, pushing it into his toothless mouth.

  There was no doubt that he was healthy, changing so rapidly and learning so quickly that she couldn’t remember ever having seen a baby so precocious. Jed would want him. He would find another woman, steady and reliable, to become his wife, to care for this remarkable child.

  Or Holden would…

  He would have to make his intentions clear once and for all. Even if he were to admit to being Gordie’s father and commit to giving the baby a father’s full care and affection, a bachelor cowhand could certainly not expect to raise a child alone. Or had he believed all along that Jedediah would adopt Gordie as he had once taken in an orphan boy named Joey?

  One way or another, the issue must be settled before she could go.

  “Holden,” she said softly.

  He stopped with a saddle in his hands, turning his head without looking at her.

  “Swear to me that Gordie will always have a good home.”

  His body shuddered once, as if she had asked him for something beyond his power to give. But when he spoke, there was no hesitation in his voice.

  “I swear,” he said.

  It was all she could ask for. Father or not, Holden had rescued Gordie. He would do what was necessary.

  Gordie’s life had just begun. Hers was over. Over and done.

  Chapter Fourteen

  THEY DIDN’T SPEAK again as Rachel gathered up the untouched food and Holden saddled the horses. Gordie gurgled and grinned while she fed him his milk, as if all the world had been made for his enjoyment.

  Holden’s touch was impersonal as he lifted her and Gordie onto Jericho’s back. They rode back in the silence of strangers.

  It was late afternoon when they reached the house. Lucia took Gordie off to feed him, and Rachel retired soon thereafter. She heard voices through the window as Holden talked with Charlie, and a little while later, he rode out again.

  Rachel lay dry-eyed on the bed for several hours, unable to rest. Just after dark, Lucia came to inquire about her, passing on Maurice’s concern, as well. She was able to answer quite steadily, and even ventured outside to thank Maurice for his interest and ask if Mr. Renshaw had gone to look for Joey. The Frenchman answered in the affirmative but eyed her intently, and she wondered if it was possible that her fresh sin was visible on her face.

  Holden was still away the next morning when Mrs. Adelaide Blackwell and her daughter, Amy, arrived.

  Lucia answered the door as Rachel changed Gordie’s diaper. She was astonished to hear strange women’s voices after weeks of hearing no one else but Lucia, and she guessed immediately who it must be. She threw on her shawl, gave Gordie to Lucia in the hallway and continued with her heart in her throat.

  “Fine ladies, the both of them,” Holden had told her, and he hadn’t meant it as a compliment. That, of course, meant little. They were the wife and daughter of the chief landowner in the county. Sean, whom she had hardly thought of for days, had gone to them when Holden had thrown him off the ranch. They might well think her unspeakably rude for not making herself known to them, though she knew it was usually the practice for the more established resident to call upon the newer.

  What might Sean have said to them? Rachel had already concluded that he had very likely been behind the bribery attempt in Javelina and that he couldn’t wish her well. He had certainly made no attempt whatsoever to renew any acquaintance with Mrs. Jedediah McCarrick. He might even have told them that he suspected she wasn’t married, if he believed it would not incriminate him.

  If they had even the slightest suspicion that she had been living at Dog Creek under false pretenses, let alone that she was a fallen woman…

  Rachel laughed silently. Remember that you have no pride left to lose.

  The ladies were looking around the parlor when she went to greet them, their expressions far too
neutral to be approving. But they smiled pleasantly enough when she welcomed them and asked them to sit, painfully aware that she had nothing but hard, rustic chairs to offer them.

  They were both attractive women, very “fine,” just as Holden had indicated…rosy and blonde, dressed in fashionable, snug-fitting gowns more appropriate to a very different setting. While Mrs. Blackwell was prim and formal, Amy’s hazel eyes sparkled, and her smile held a surprising degree of warmth.

  “My dear Mrs. McCarrick,” she said. “I have been so longing to meet you. I see that everything Sean has said about you was true.”

  Rachel was sufficiently in control of herself that she didn’t stiffen at Miss Blackwell’s ambiguous remark. Miss Blackwell continued before she had a chance to reply.

  “We sincerely hope that we haven’t inconvenienced you by arriving so unexpectedly,” the girl said. She glanced down at her gloved hands. “We have been unconscionably remiss in not calling upon you before. I hope you can forgive us.”

  Rachel would gladly have wished them to the devil, but there was no help for it now.

  I could tell them the truth and be done with it. But she had no understanding of what such a revelation might set in motion. Holden clearly wanted her to maintain her masquerade, and she intended to do so until Gordie’s future was secured.

  “It is no inconvenience at all,” she said, returning Amy’s smile as if she truly meant it. “I have been remiss myself. May I get you tea?”

  “That would be delightful, wouldn’t it, Mother?”

  Mrs. Blackwell nodded briefly, and Rachel rushed into the kitchen. She had nothing better than a few stained china cups to serve in, and only the common sort of tea offered in the store in Javelina.

  She returned to the parlor while the tea was brewing and pulled a chair nearer the Blackwells. “You must think me quite a hermit, Mrs. Blackwell, Miss Blackwell. I am afraid that I was a little overwhelmed by the country when I first arrived, and with Mr. McCarrick absent…” She smiled again. “That is no excuse, of course, but I do very much appreciate your call. I am sure that Jedediah would be equally pleased if he were present.”