“Then I will talk to Callie and Chayton about it,” Hudson agreed.
“Oh, thank you!” Ina cried, and suddenly turned and threw her arms around Hudson’s neck.
The next thing he knew, her soft lips were touching his. He hadn’t intended to take advantage of that kiss, but he found his arms reaching around her, pulling her close, letting the kiss grow, until his heart swelled with the love he had been trying to keep in check all this time. Now he could let it fly free. He did not have to keep it captive within his heart any longer.
When their lips parted, Ina still clung to Hudson.
“Do it soon, Hudson. Go right today and tell them to send out a preacher to marry us as soon as it can be arranged!”
“Are you sure? Maybe you should wait until your memory comes back. Then I would know…”
“No! It may be years before my memory comes back! I want to feel safe and secure in your arms now!”
“Fine, I will see if I can catch up with them,” Hudson said and jumped on his horse to follow after the group that just left.
“What was that all about?” Cooper asked as he walked up to Ina. “Hudson seemed in a big hurry to take off to someplace.”
“He has gone to inform my guardians that he and I wish to get married,” she said truthfully.
“What? You had promised me, and I will hold you to your promise!”
“If I ever promised you, it must have been during a moment of insanity. I cannot imagine I would ever agree to marry a person like you! Besides being an old man, I don’t see a redeeming quality about you that would have interested me.”
Cooper stepped forward and grabbed her arm.
“You are not going to get away with this,” he growled.
“If I was you, I would release the lady’s arm,” the voice of Adoette broke in.
Cooper spun around and glared at the Comanche.
“Scum like you are not going to tell me what to do,” Cooper retorted.
“If you do not release Ina at once, we will pick you up bodily and throw you off this ranch!”
It was Chogan speaking, and he had Dohate along with Ezhno standing behind him.
“I can sack the lot of you,” Cooper claimed.
“Not without Callie and Chayton’s agreement,” Chogan stated. “Ina does not wish your attention. I suggest you leave well enough alone!”
Cooper turned angrily and stomped away.
“Thank you,” Ina murmured. “I see you are my true friends whether I remember you or not.”
“You are safe as long as we remain,” Chogan assured her.
“I heard you say something about Hudson asking you to marry him,” Adoette said, quietly.
“Actually, I asked him. I think I love him and want him for a husband.”
“He seems to be a good man. I know he was going out of his way to impress you when you made him a work hand.”
“He has impressed me in many other ways as well,” Ina told him.
“Then he is a lucky man, Miakoda. I had hoped you would have noticed me the way you were noticing him.”
“I am sure you are a good man too, Adoette.”
Ina turned and went back in the house. She was still shaking from her encounter with Cooper. She couldn’t wait for Hudson to return. She was looking forward to becoming his wife.
When Hudson returned, Ina was sitting, waiting for him in the parlor. He entered the room, looking at Ina with love in his eyes.
Ina rose to her feet and went toward him.
“What did they say?” she asked anxiously.
“They were rather shocked you requested me to marry you. While they like the idea, they are certain you will regain your memory soon. They want to be sure it is what you truly want, so they suggested we wait until Tommy and Beth have their wedding. Then we will all get married at the same time. It may end up to be a pretty crowded wedding ceremony,” he half-chuckled.
“No!” Ina cried. “Cooper is already upset that I have asked you to be my husband.”
“You told him?”
“I thought it would make him back off, but instead he threatened that he wouldn’t let me get away with it.”
Ina grasped Hudson around the neck.
“I am so frightened, Hudson. We can’t wait that long!”
“I will be here. You will be safe.”
“I won’t be safe! You sleep in another room. You have to work on the ranch and leave me on my own.”
“I will have Adoette guard you if I can’t be by your side,” Hudson offered.
“Promise me you will stay beside me at night, then,” she begged.
“I suppose I could bring the cot back…”
“No, Hudson. I want your arms around me at night so I will feel safe. I keep having these dreams of being caught in a storm and Cooper is not far away. I am hiding from him and if he finds me, my life will be in danger.”
“You are dreaming about what has already happened,” Ina. “You and Adoette were hiding when you discovered Cooper selling the steers from your ranch. As soon as your memory returns, you can report him for what he did.”
“That makes him even more dangerous!” Ina insisted. “He would be the last one to want me to get my memory back if he thought I knew about him taking cattle.”
“You may be right. I hadn’t thought about that. He probably believes if he can trick you into marrying him, you could never testify against him. If he became a part of your family ranch, he wouldn’t have to steal cattle from you any longer, and he would be off the hook. He knows you suspect him because you have been going through the books he used to keep for Pritchard.”
“I don’t care about the ranch or Pritchard’s cattle. I just don’t want him near me. I want you near me, Hudson!”
“Don’t worry. I will remain by your side and protect you.”
“Even at night?” she asked, looking up at him with her pleading eyes.
“Even at night,” he whispered, letting his lips lower until he was tasting her lips once again. It was a pass time he would never tire of, he thought, as he deepened his kiss. His reward was that Ina responded fully to his kiss, desperately crushing herself to him. The feel of her soft breasts pressed firmly against his chest, and her hands tangling in his hair, now consumed him. He never wanted to lift his lips from hers.
His grasp tightened around her waist, pulling her against him more firmly, knowing the very act ignited an overwhelming need for her. She wanted him to hold her at night. He thought of all the times he smoothed the cool washcloth over her body, wishing it did not separate her skin from his touch. He didn’t know if he could trust himself to hold her every night until they could be married? His demanding love for her was racing through every vein of his body, causing his heart to pound out of control. He found himself lifting her up in his arms and carrying her upstairs to her room. He didn’t think he could wait until they were married either!
Hudson lowered Ina upon the bed.
“You should probably rest,” he murmured, trying to muster up his self-control. “You seem so upset, and I don’t want you to have a relapse.”
“Bring my nightdress, then” she murmured.
Hudson turned, lifting the nightdress from over the back of a chair where she had placed it earlier that morning. The material felt soft and silky between his fingers. He let his fingers caress the material before he handed it to her.
He started to turn, but Ina grabbed his hand.
“You have removed my clothes for me before,” she mumbled. “I want you to do it now.”
“You were sick, then,” he pointed out, starting to back away.
“I feel too weak to undress myself,” Ina breathed. “I liked the way your fingers felt when you were tending to me before. I want you to tend to me again. I want to feel your hands caressing the damp cloth against my body.”
She nodded to the basin where water waited for the cloth to be dipped into it.
“Make my body feel calm again,” she begged.
>
“You won’t be angry at me if…”
“I am asking you, Hudson.”
Hudson knelt by the side of the bed and began unfastening the buttons of Ina’s shirt. It fell away revealing her quivering, white skin, and the hidden curves proving she was more of a woman than a cowboy. Before, Hudson had hidden the view of her from his gaze with a towel, but now he boldly looked upon her body. This would be the body he would share in love and marriage, even though there were nagging doubts about agreeing to marry her before she got her memory back.
He pushed the doubts aside, as he let his fingers release the brass buttons of her denims and then gently pull them free of her. She rested there upon the bed, her eye closed, as close to the vision of an angle as he could imagine, and his hand trembled when he reached for the cloth and dipped it in the water.
Hudson watched his hand as he stroked the cloth leisurely across her body, ever so slowly, wanting this moment to last a lifetime. Her skin quivered at the touch of the cloth, and he noticed her taking in her breath, as the cloth lowered to smooth over her legs, and then back up again. He tried to restrain his need to discover how his touch would affect her if he let himself get lost in what he was doing. He had already gone beyond decency, but she had asked him to and he knew he wanted what she was asking him to do.
His own desperate need to feel her skin beneath his fingers gave way, and the cloth fell by the wayside, as he traced his fingers over her body, touching where the cloth had touched before his fingers gained that delight. The delight overtook him, as her murmurs filled his ears and prodded him on, wanting to give her more pleasure than a simple cloth could afford. He couldn’t stop his lips from following the trail of his fingers. He relished in the taste of her skin against his tongue, wanting more of the taste of her until he was caught up in the very taste and feel of her. His mouth sought more until she was panting at his touch, and then whimpering for him to never stop. He didn’t want to stop until he had filled her with contentment.
“Hudson,” Ina half-cried. “The way you touch me, I hadn’t imagined…”
Then her voice caught and she shivered in the pleasure of Hudson’s caresses. He placed his hungry mouth upon her welcoming lips and drank in the essence of her, as she wrapped her arms around him, fumbling with the buttons of his shirt.
“I want to touch you too,” she begged.
Hudson grabbed her hand.
“Not yet,” he cautioned. “I never should have been touching you like this. You should rest. If you like, I’ll stay beside you.”
“Never stop touching me, Hudson,” she murmured, placing his hand upon her breast.
“When we are married, I will obey your request. For now, I shouldn’t take advantage of the situation any more than I have.”
“You sound like you regret what you have been doing,” Ina said, lifting herself up on her elbow and looking at him.
“I don’t regret it. I just believe it is too soon for this much intimacy. What if you gain your memory and hate me for what I have done?”
“I won’t hate you, Hudson. I could never hate you!”
“You sure?” he asked, wanting to believe her.
“You know I won’t hate you. You comforted me when I was sick. You are comforting me now. I like the way you comfort me.”
“Ina, Ina, if I could only believe you…”
“Mia,” she whispered. “Call me Mia.”
Hudson stilled. She was right. She was no longer Ina. She had become Mia, and he wondered if Mia was the same strong self-sufficient woman Ina was? Mia seemed timid and frightened all the time, not that woman who braved the storm to discover what Cooper was up to. She relied on his strength, and he sort of liked that feeling, but it had been the Ina part of her who impressed him the most. Would she ever gain her old self back again? He knew for certain Ina would not be inviting him to her bed and begging him to hold her. As much as that was what he wanted Ina to do, she would have been too sure of herself to need him to comfort her, he realized.
“Hold me,” Ina whispered, pulling Hudson’s arms around her. “Never stop holding me!”
Hudson found himself falling asleep beside the beauty he had been caressing. His dreams were filled with her, allowing him to live his fantasy of his marriage to her, going beyond just touching, in his dream.
He felt Ina starting to thrash, and it woke him up.
“Am I hurting you?” he asked in alarm.
Only he discovered she was still asleep. She was having a nightmare, crying out, begging her daddy not to touch her.
“Wake up, Ina,” Hudson encouraged. “No one is hurting you!”
“No, daddy, I don’t want to. Don’t make me!” she cried again.
“I won’t make you do anything,” Hudson told her, as he tried to hug her to him.
“No, daddy, it hurts! It hurts too much! Get off of me, daddy!”
She was pushing against Hudson’s chest, as tears started to stream down her cheeks.
“It’s not right, daddy. It’s not right for you to do this! I’m only a little girl!”
She gave a whimper.
“I do love you, daddy, I do. Yes, I know you love me. You love me too much! Don’t love me that way, Daddy!”
“Wake up!” Hudson yelled. “It is only a dream. God, did your father…?” He couldn’t utter the words. No wonder Ina had been so indifferent towards him and other men. No telling what her own father did to her when she was young?
He started shaking her, trying to wake her from the dream as she continued to beg for him not to touch her.
Suddenly Ina’s eyes flew open. Hudson was relieved until he saw the horror in her eyes.
“What are you doing?” she screeched at him, starting to pound on his chest. “Get off of me, before I call for Chogan!”
She looked down at her nude body and started screaming.
“Get out! Get out! You no longer work here! Go back to New York where you belong!”
“Ina, I can explain,” Hudson muttered.
“Explain? Explain why you are in my room with your hands all over me? Who do you think you are? What are you doing in the house? You are supposed to be in the bunkhouse!”
“You were sick. You got sick from being out in the storm.”
“And that gives you permission to come to my room like this?”
“It’s not what you think it is. You asked me to hold you and…”
“Oh, God, can you hear yourself? If I had asked you to do that, why am I so upset at this moment?”
“Yeah,” Hudson said, pulling himself out of the bed. “I should have known it was too good to be true! You probably don’t remember, but you were begging me to marry you earlier this morning. Well, at least, I see you got your memory back. I will inform Chogan and have him call your family. They will be happy to see you are back to your rude, normal self!”
“Got my memory back? What are you talking about?”
“Ask Chogan, when he comes. You are right! I don’t belong here. I thought I could become something I shouldn’t have hoped to become. Now I will return to New York since I can see you would never appreciate anything I ever did for you!”
Hudson turned and left the room, bumping into to Chogan in the hallway.
“What’s, all, the ruckus?” he asked.
“Ina got her memory back. Everyone should be happy now!” he said gruffly as he pushed past Chogan.
Hudson went to the stable and saddled up his horse. He had to run off some steam, and then he would pack his bags and hightail it out of there, just like his daddy did before him!
CHAPTER TWENTY
By the time Chogan knocked on her door, Ina had pulled her clothes back on and flung the door open. When she saw Chogan standing there she melted into tears and clung to his neck.
“What happened?” Chogan asked.
“Who allowed Hudson in this house?” she demanded. “He tried to rape me!”
“What? Hudson would never… He said you got your memory
back. Now I understand. Don’t you know Hudson has been caring for you for several weeks now? You wouldn’t let anyone else near you. You got a fever after the storm and lost your memory. You couldn’t remember anyone, not even me! You screamed when Adoette and I were in your room. Hudson has been caring for you and fulfilling your wishes.”
“Was it one of my wishes that he be in my bed when I was wearing no clothes?” Ina demanded.
“I don’t know. I do know he would never have been in your bed unless you agreed to it. He was very careful to treat you with every respect a lady deserves. Only you insisted he be the only one to care for you. I don’t know how much you remember about what has been happening since the storm, but you need to calm yourself.
“Hudson took off like he wasn’t planning on coming back, except maybe to pack his bags! I don’t know what you said to him, but he deserves an apology, once he returns. Your parents are home now. I’ll send Adoette to fetch your mother and Connor, then we can get this all straightened out.”
“He was touching me,” Ina hissed.
“I prayed the Gods would release the evil spirit that caused you to lose your memory. Now I wonder what those evil spirits were up to. You were a more pleasant person when your memory was lost. Perhaps you were protecting yourself from things in your life you didn’t want to face by losing your memory. You are a brave young woman, my Miakoda, I am sure you have faced a lot of challenges during your life. Just don’t make new challenges for yourself. Hudson is a good man. I think he loves you. You need to give him a chance and not chase him out of your life.”
“He merely works here,” Ina said under her breath.
“Yeah, he merely works here, just like the rest of us. You need a man in your life, Ina, and I think Hudson is the one. Don’t alienate him with your silly pride. However, Adoette likes you. He could always be your second choice.”
“Men,” Ina cried, “they think all women are good for is to make into wives, and just like my Daddy, force them to have babies, and after they have babies…”
Ina stopped. Her mind was suddenly jogged back to the dream she was having before Hudson woke her up.
“Oh no!” she cried. “No, no, no! No wonder I don’t trust men!”
Within the Heart Page 21