She squeezed his buttock as she tongued and teased his nipple and, after about twenty minutes of that, he was hard again, jutting within her like a ramrod. But this time Caroline meant to take her pleasure purely from pleasing her husband.
Kissing the underside of his chin, she began to move against him, very slowly, taking him in and out, in and out. With a muffled shout of frustration and need, Guthrie rolled onto his back, taking Caroline with him, and she sat impaled on his manhood, her hands clutching his powerful shoulders.
She was the warrior princess, claiming her spoils, and she put Guthrie through his paces as she took him from one level of savage delight to another. Finally, he cried out and arched his back, and Caroline toyed with his nipples as she drained him of every essence. When it was over, he drew her down beside him, pressed her close, and fell into a sound sleep.
Presently, Caroline slept, too. When she awakened, the room was full of shadows and Guthrie was washing her gently with a soft, cool cloth. After he’d finished, he set her astraddle of his mouth and repaid her thoroughly for the way she’d conquered him earlier. She gripped the railings of the bedstead, just as he had, and surrendered, crooning as his hands rose to cover her breasts.
Her sobs of release were lusty—again, she could not restrain them—and the bedsprings creaked as she thrust her knees wide apart.
Guthrie made no effort at all to quiet his bride. Indeed, the more noise she made, the better he seemed to like it.
Chapter
The first full day of Caroline’s marriage dawned sunny and bright, but it didn’t take long for clouds to appear in the relationship. She and Guthrie were sitting at a corner table in the hotel’s small dining room, having breakfast, when he announced, “I’m leaving today.”
Caroline put down her fork. “What?”
“I’ll be able to track Flynn a lot faster if I don’t have to worry about looking after you.”
It was her fury that made her speak softly, not an attempt at cooperation. “Well,” she began, leaning forward, “you could simply have me thrown in jail. That would probably keep me out of your way.”
Guthrie sighed. “Caroline.”
“Have you ever read the Bible, Mr. Hayes?” she pressed, her voice a rapid-fire hiss now. “There’s a verse in the Book of Ruth that begins, ‘Whither thou goest, I will go’!”
He looked implacable. “I said you’re staying.”
Caroline saw a lifetime of such arbitrary statements looming ahead and, suddenly, she couldn’t face it. She pulled the golden band she secretly cherished from her finger and set it on the blue-and-white checked tablecloth, between her plate and Guthrie’s.
His eyes widened, then narrowed. “Put that back on,” he ordered.
Caroline shook her head. “Mr. Hayes, it is time you learned, once and for all, that you cannot order me about like you do your dog.”
Guthrie sighed, obviously conscious of the other diners and how interesting they would find the exchange if they should happen to overhear. “You are my wife.”
“And that puts me in the same category as your dog?”
“Of course not!”
“Then I will thank you not to make grand pronouncements concerning my life!”
Guthrie tossed down his napkin, even though he was only half finished with his bacon and eggs. “There are certain things that a husband just decides …”
“Things that concern only himself, perhaps,” Caroline interrupted crisply. “But whether I go with you or stay here in Cheyenne and twiddle my thumbs for weeks or months is certainly my affair!”
“Damn it, Caroline, Flynn is dangerous. And we’ve just been lucky so far that we haven’t had trouble with the Shoshone …”
“A few days ago, you were convinced Mr. Flynn had come to Cheyenne, that he was just waiting to pounce.” She sat back in her chair, spreading the fingers on both hands and touching them together at the tips. “It seems to me that Cheyenne is the last place I should be,”
Guthrie’s jaw clamped down, then relaxed again. “He’s not here, Caroline.”
“How do you know?”
“I’ve asked the people who would have made his acquaintance,” Guthrie answered, and his taut politeness had a sharp sting to it. “Besides, I’m not going to leave you here in the hotel. You’ll be staying with a friend of mine—a Mr. Roy Loudon.”
“Roy …?”
“Loudon,” Guthrie finished for her. And if the tone of his voice was anything to judge by, he was as resolute as before. “He’s the rancher I worked for—a widower. I ran into him in the Diamond Lady when we first arrived, and he said he could use a tutor for his boy.”
Caroline was amazed. Guthrie had never even mentioned this man to her. Now he apparently expected her to be pleased at the prospect of going to live in a stranger’s home. “What kind of man spends his daylight hours in a saloon?” she demanded. “Besides, it wouldn’t be proper for me to live in a masculine household unchaperoned.”
“You won’t be unchaperoned,” Guthrie argued flatly. “Roy has a housekeeper, Jardena Craig. She’ll look out for your virtue, believe me.”
Caroline felt her heart tighten within her until it ached. Guthrie actually meant to leave her, after less than one day of marriage, to chase after Seaton Flynn. Mr. Flynn was deadly and of course there were numerous other perils that could befall a lone rider. She looked away for a moment. “Suppose I tell you I’ll follow you?”
“If you try to trail me, Wildcat,” he warned, in a grave undertone, “I’ll catch you. The first thing I’ll do is turn you across my knee. The second thing is take you back to Laramie and hand you over to Marshal Stone for safekeeping. That would take up valuable time but trust me, I’ll do it if I have to.”
Caroline could feel her face heating. She was beaten, but she kept her peace because it would have wounded her pride to say so. As subtly as she could, she reached out for the wedding band Guthrie had given her, tucking it into the pocket of her divided riding skirt.
Guthrie closed his hand over hers. She felt a sweet jolt, as though he’d somehow sent a charge up her arm and into her heart. “Caroline, if we’re going to have any chance at happiness, we have to get Flynn back to Laramie. And you know I’ll find him faster if I’m on my own.”
She took her wedding ring from her pocket and squeezed it tight in her palm, like a talisman. She wouldn’t wear it again, she decided, until she and Guthrie could be together permanently, like a real husband and wife. “I’ll miss you very much,” she admitted, averting her eyes.
Although Caroline wished with all her soul for some poetic avowal of love and fidelity from Guthrie, all she got was one of his crooked smiles and, “I plan to see that you don’t forget me.”
They went back to their room then, Guthrie gripping Caroline’s ringless hand, and he kept his word. He stripped her and made such tender, thorough love to her that she knew his mark was branded on her soul for all time.
When it was over, she slowly lowered her hands from the bed rail, which she’d been grasping in a fever of ecstasy, and rested them on his shoulders. ‘Oh, Guthrie, if you don’t come back …”
He silenced her with a light, nibbling kiss, his breath still coming hard. His voice was raspy when he spoke. “I’ll be back, Wildcat. You and I will go back to Bolton and explain everything to Miss Phoebe and Miss Ethel, then we’ll see about going to Chicago to start searching for your sisters.”
Caroline’s eyes brimmed with tears. “Guthrie, I lo …” she began, but he lowered his mouth to hers and swallowed the tender words she would have said.
In the early afternoon, they rode out to Roy Loudon’s ranch and, with each mile they traveled, another piece of Caroline’s bruised heart fell away and shattered on the hard reality of her circumstances. Despite what he said, Guthrie could easily be killed, or simply decide he didn’t want to be burdened with a wife after all.
The Loudon place was huge; Guthrie told Caroline that Roy owned the land as far as they could
see in any direction. In fact, they’d been on his property almost from the moment they rode out of Cheyenne.
The frame house was modest, sturdy and white, with green painted shutters and windows that sparkled in the sun. Grass grew in the front yard, and there were pink tea roses climbing the brick fireplaces at both ends of the structure.
A substantial woman with dark hair pulled tightly back from her face came out onto the porch, smoothing her apron. This, no doubt, was Jardena Craig, the housekeeper who would see to the preservation of Caroline’s virtue.
As if, Caroline thought dryly, Guthrie had left anything to be preserved.
Mrs. Craig came down the front steps, a cautious yet hopeful expression on her moon-shaped face. Her skin was pock-marked, her eyes small and dark, but her mouth was wide and generous.
Caroline was only too aware of her own divided skirt, rumpled blouse and hastily braided hair. She stood close to Guthrie after he helped her down from her horse.
“Well, Guthrie Hayes,” Mrs. Craig boomed, her bright smile making her almost pretty. “I thought sure the devil woulda caught up with you by now and left nothing but bone and gristle.”
He gave Caroline a brief, fond glance. “I’m not sure it would be fair to blame the devil,” he answered, and Mrs. Craig laughed and extended a big, workworn hand to Caroline.
“Jardena Craig,” she said, in her thundering voice. “It’d be real fine to hear a woman’s voice call me by my Christian name.”
Guthrie made introductions before Caroline could speak. “Miss Caroline Chalmers,” he said.
She looked up at him, surprised he hadn’t presented her as his wife, and then swallowed the lump of humiliation that rose in her throat. Guthrie obviously didn’t want Jardena to know he’d married Caroline, although the fact was probably common knowledge in town.
“How do you do?” she said to Jardena, to fill in the ensuing conversational lapse.
“Look at you,” Jardena said, taking Caroline’s arm and propelling her through the gate and up the walk toward the front porch. “Just a skinny little thing. Hasn’t Guthrie been feeding you?”
Caroline was still in something of a daze, trying to make sense of the fact that Guthrie had virtually disavowed her. “Yes,” she answered, “but it was mostly just beef jerky.”
At that, Jardena laughed and shook her head.
Minutes later, Caroline was settled in the housekeeper’s big, warm kitchen, with a steaming cup of tea before her. Guthrie had gone to seek out Mr. Loudon without so much as a fare-thee-well to Caroline.
“How did you happen to hook up with the likes of Guthrie Hayes?” Jardena asked, setting a plate of molasses cookies in front of Caroline.
She reached for one of the soft brown cookies sprinkled with coarse white sugar, stalling for time to think of an acceptable answer.
Jardena slapped her big thighs with both hands. “There I go again, buttin’ in where I don’t have no business. Mr. Loudon’s real pleased to get a teacher for his boy.”
“When can I meet this child?” Caroline asked.
There was a mountain of dough resting on the worktable, and Mrs. Craig set to kneading it with a vengeance. “Ferris’ll be along soon. He’s out on the range with his pa right now.”
Although Caroline loved children, she wasn’t looking forward to the task ahead. All she could think of was that she wanted to stay by Guthrie’s side—she wanted to know, firsthand, that he was all right. “Mr. Loudon has textbooks, I hope.”
Jardena sighed. “A whole library full of ’em. Would you like something else besides them cookies?”
Caroline shook her head and pushed back her chair. “If you could just tell me where to find my room,” she said, picking up the valise she’d left sitting on the floor at her feet. “I’d like to freshen up a little before I meet Mr. Loudon and Ferris.”
The woman gestured toward a rear stairway rising beside the huge iron cookstove, with its hot water reservoir and warming ovens. The chrome trim gleamed with cleanliness, as did what Caroline had seen of the rest of the house. “Third door on your right,” the housekeeper said.
Carrying her valise, Caroline set out for the second floor. Her room was small but immaculate, like the rest of the house. The bed was white iron, but there was a colorful quilt adorning it, and the curtains at the windows were a crisp, cheerful yellow. A washstand with a crockery pitcher and bowl stood in one corner, and Caroline knew without looking that there would be a chamber pot in the cupboard beneath. From the window, she had a sweeping view of the range, which seemed to race away from her, losing itself in forever.
Glumly, Caroline shook out her clothes and hung them from the pegs aligned neatly along one wall. Then she washed her face and hands with her own soap, after pouring fresh water from the pitcher to the basin.
When she came downstairs again, sometime later, her face glowed with cleanliness and her hair had been brushed and wound into a loose knot at the back of her head. Jardena immediately directed her to Mr. Loudon’s study.
Caroline felt nervous as she approached that room, which sat at the front of the house, opposite the parlor. She knocked softly and heard a gruff, “Come in,” from beyond the door.
Guthrie was standing next to the fireplace, while a giant of a man rose from his chair behind the desk, his hair dark, his eyes a piercing blue. He seemed to look right inside Caroline and read all her innermost secrets.
Standing respectfully next to the desk was a handsome lad about nine or ten years old. He had blue eyes, like his father’s, and golden hair, and Caroline knew in an instant that she was dealing with that most mischievous of creatures, a motherless boy.
Guthrie made introductions, again leaving out the fact that Caroline was legally his wife, and she began to wonder if he’d already set her aside in his mind. Heaven knew, it wasn’t an uncommon occurrence in the West for a man to abandon a tiresome wife.
Only later, when Guthrie was preparing to ride away, taking Tob with him, did Caroline get a chance to confront him.
“Why didn’t you tell these people that I’m your wife?” she demanded, her whisper rendered sharp by her fear that she would never see Guthrie again.
He lifted her left hand and kissed the place where his wedding band had been. “You were the one who made the decision to keep the wedding a secret, Wildcat, not me.”
Caroline’s yearning to go with him was so intense that she nearly couldn’t bear it. “Please, Guthrie, don’t leave me here. I can’t bear the thought of conjugating verbs and working out mathematical problems and reciting poetry.”
Guthrie sighed philosophically. “You’re a teacher,” he reminded her. “So teach. Right now, Ferris needs you.”
She gripped his hand when he would have lifted it to the saddle horn and mounted. “Guthrie, when will I see you again?”
He touched her forehead lightly with his lips. “Pretty soon I’ll be underfoot so much that you’ll be thinking up ways to get rid of me,” he answered hoarsely. And then he swung up into the saddle and touched the brim of his seedy hat. “Mind what I said before, Caroline,” he warned in parting. “I’ve never laid a hand on a woman in anger before, but I’ll make an exception if I catch you tagging along after me, and it’ll be a long time ’til you feel disposed to sit down.”
Caroline hated his officious manner but, deep down, she knew he was right. She would only hinder him on the trail, and it was unlikely that Seaton would dare breach the borders of the Loudon ranch to molest her in any way.
“Good-bye,” she said brokenly.
Guthrie nodded remotely and rode away. Not only hadn’t he told her he loved her, he hadn’t even bothered to say farewell.
After composing herself, and collecting a supply of paper and some pencils from the house, Caroline sought out her student. It wasn’t hard to find Ferris, for he was sitting on the front step and she nearly tripped over him.
“Could we go to the pond?” he asked eagerly.
“Not today,” Caroli
ne replied formally. “We’re staying right here, on the porch, and you’re going to show me what you’ve learned.” She handed him some paper and a pencil, along with a book to put underneath for a hard surface, and sat down in one of the two rocking chairs that graced the spacious veranda. “I’d like you to write two paragraphs telling me whether or not you think Wyoming Territory should become a state and why.”
Ferris looked at her blankly. “I don’t much give a damn one way or the other,” he said, in a forthright manner.
“Pretend you do,” Caroline replied instantly, already caught up in writing down a series of mathematical problems for the young Mr. Loudon to solve.
“I saw Mr. Hayes kiss you,” he said. Again, there was no malice in his voice, only that incredible directness, and Caroline found herself liking the boy. “Do you mean to marry him or something?”
“My relationship with Mr. Hayes is none of your business, young man,” Caroline told the child pleasantly. “Now, if you would please write those paragraphs …”
Ferris bent his head and wrote diligently for a long time. The breeze ruffled his light hair, and Caroline thought sadly of Lily, whose tresses had been just that color, the pale yellow of cornsilk, when she’d seen her last.
Finally, Ferris looked up. “You could marry my pa if you wanted to, I reckon. We could use a wife around here.”
Caroline was touched. Obviously, the little boy missed his mother. “You have Jardena,” she pointed out, in the firm yet gentle tones a good teacher masters early.
“She already had one husband, and she doesn’t want another,” Ferris said. “She says it’s only by the grace of the good Lord that she never kilt the one she had.”
Caroline hid a smile. “I see.”
Ferris turned his attention back to his assignment without being bidden, but when he’d scribbled out the second paragraph, he came right back to the subject at hand. “My pa would make some woman a good husband,” he said earnestly. “He’s got money in the bank and lots of land and cattle.”
CAROLINE AND THE RAIDER Page 29