by Susan Fox
Gabe seemed to notice she was troubled, and he gave her hands a squeeze. “What is it, darlin’?”
When she couldn’t answer right away, the solemnity that came over him gave her actual pain, and she couldn’t keep silent another moment. She could trust this man with anything, especially her heart. She’d been a fool to wait. Lainey let go of his hands to urgently place her palms on his lean cheeks.
“I love you, Gabe.”
Emotion made the words come out softly. The breath she managed to get in next came out on a gust of longing and hope.
“I’ve loved you since I was eighteen. I thought it had stopped but it hadn’t, and I’ve wanted so desperately to tell you. It doesn’t matter if you don’t love me yet.”
The big room went silent for several frantic heartbeats until Gabe’s low voice filled it. “Who says I don’t love you?”
A sparkling volley of joy showered gently over Lainey’s heart, but she didn’t dare breathe as she waited for the words.
“I’d been planning to tell your daddy that I wanted to see you, to marry you if you’d have me. When he asked what I wanted for protecting you, I figured that was the time to bring up the subject. He put his answer in the will.”
He kissed her then, softly and expertly, the tenderness between them especially sweet before he slowly ended the kiss. As he drew back, his dark eyes melded deeply with hers.
“I love you, Mrs. Patton. It’s past time to show you again.”
As big and hard as Gabe’s hands were, they were adept at small things and his touch was tantalizingly light. He reached behind her to slowly lower the zipper on the bodice of her sundress before he slid the narrow straps down. He left the bodice in place as his big hands lowered to grip her waist and he stared deeply into her eyes.
“Like I said, I’d like to unwrap you slow tonight, darlin’. Let you unwrap me.”
Lainey moved her hands to his shirt and lowered the turquoise piece on his string tie before she began to unbutton his shirt.
They undressed each other slowly, lingeringly, but sometime after they’d finished and moved to the bed, their lovemaking grew tenderly fierce. Later, they drifted to sleep, but not until they’d had a few more kisses and whispered a few more love words.
There’d always be a few more love words, and a few more, and a few more. Enough to make up for a lifetime of silences and yearnings, and more than enough to lavish on each other and on the children who would come into their lives one by one those next years.
They joined their land along with their hearts. Patton Talbot Ranch was massive, with a proud legacy and an impressive heritage for each of their children.
Who in their time would yearn and love and marry, then pass it on.
ISBN: 978-1-4603-6584-7
THE PRODIGAL WIFE
First North American Publication 2003.
Copyright © 2002 by Susan Fox.
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