by Carol Arens
“But—”
“Everyone over there?” He inclined his head toward the group walking into the house. “They have nothing to do with this. I agreed to it, they didn’t.”
“When I said ‘I do’—” she touched his face because it was so dear to her and if he sent her away she might never see it again “—I agreed, Boone. I’m staying.”
“Even if you’re their best hope? They need you. It would be different if you couldn’t shoot a cow at ten feet. But, you—you’d make your Annie Oakley sit up and take a look. It’s up to you to see them safe away, just like it’s up to me to get rid of what Kings I can. You see that, don’t you?”
The misery of it was that she did see it. She also saw that Boone would probably be killed if he faced the gang alone.
How could he force her to make an impossible choice?
Hard truth kicked her in the heart, reminding her that he was not forcing a choice. Just pointing to the only choice there was.
He touched her chin with one big finger, lifted her face.
“I’m counting on you, honey.”
Then he kissed her, sweetly, tenderly, while hot tears streamed down her cheeks.
* * *
Bread and butter sat on the dinner table, sliced and ready to eat. But even with the enticement of strawberry jam, all anyone did was stare at it.
Taut nerves twisted Melinda’s stomach, making her feel half nauseous. She went to the window, gazed out at the night.
A storm was gathering, which seemed fitting.
“Do you think we ought to wait so long to leave?” Trudy asked. “Maybe we should go now?”
“No. I want to be sure the Kings aren’t on the road already,” Boone said. “For now it’s safer here. But if they haven’t shown by midnight, we can assume that they don’t want to leave their beds. At least the storm’s in our favor.”
In the window’s reflection, she saw Giselle finish feeding Diana then button the front of her shirt. She stood, carried the baby to Boone.
“I owe the folks in this room so much,” she said, setting Diana in his arms. “Doc, for bringing my baby safely into the world, of course, but I never expected to be beholden to an outlaw and his wife. When I first saw the pair of you, I was frightened; quite distrustful. I just want you to know that when Diana’s old enough to be told what happened here she will know that Boone Walker, a hero, saved her life.”
Giselle’s footsteps crossed the wood floor, becoming quiet for the time that she walked over the rug.
“I still can’t figure out how you talked Bird out of killing us.” She touched Melinda’s arm where it was folded around her middle. “I’ll puzzle over it the rest of my days.”
“Well, the gun spoke rather loudly. But, still, it’s not so hard to convince men of things.” Melinda glanced over at Giselle, tried to smile. “You understand.”
Giselle shook her head. “I wish I did. If I could do what you do, my husband would be here today. You, my friend, could have talked Efrin into licking his own boots clean.”
When Diana began to fuss, Giselle kissed Melinda’s cheek then went back to her infant.
Melinda focused her gaze past the window’s reflection. Lightning skittered across the horizon, but closer to the house the sky still glittered with stars.
“You going back to Jasper Springs, Doc Brown?” she heard Edward say.
“It used to be a good place to live. For the sake of those who didn’t make it, I’d like to go back. Make their deaths count for something. For now, I reckon I’ll wait and see.”
Wait and see if Boone—if he killed enough of them to free the town before he was murdered?
If he did survive it would be because others died. Not that they hadn’t freely invited their fates. But given Boone’s feelings about killing, would he be able to live with the regret?
This and similar questions had lashed at her all afternoon. It was hard to remember when she’d been so sick at heart.
No doubt she couldn’t remember because she never had been.
“What about you, Edward? Where will your new start be?” the doc asked.
“I reckon I’ll go where Trudy and Stanley settle. I’d like to rebuild in Jasper Springs, but I’ll like grandbabies even more.”
“Is there a lawyer in Jasper Springs?” Stanley asked.
If one more person discussed plans for a happy future she might scream out loud.
Surely they realized that their protector’s future might only consist of the next several hours and that she had no future at all without him.
“There used to be a fine lawyer. But not since the Kings declared their own law.”
From what they were saying, the poor fellow hadn’t lasted a month before the Kings killed him for standing up to them.
Next, the conversation turned to weapons. What they would take with them in the wagon and what Boone would keep here.
Her mind wandered morbidly until she heard Stanley’s voice.
“Given that I haven’t finished seeing to Boone’s freedom,” Stanley announced, “I’ve decided to remain behind when the rest of you go.”
Well, she truly could not love the lawyer more if he were her blood-and-bone brother.
“I appreciate that, but you’ll be needed to protect the women and the children.”
“Edward and Dr. Brown will protect them. I’m with you.”
She didn’t want to return her attention to the room’s reflection, but couldn’t help herself.
“You’re a good friend, Stanley.” Boone was smiling, falsely, she believed, but smiling nonetheless. “But you’re about to become a married man. You’ve got responsibilities.”
And Boone was not a married man!
“As do you, my friend,” Stanley murmured.
She spun around. Heat flushed her face while she stared Boone down. A blow to the gut could not feel worse. How was it that he put more value on another’s marriage than on his own?
The ache in her chest nearly doubled her up. Worse, words failed her. Without her best weapon to aid her, there was nothing left to do but dash out the front door and race for the sanctuary of the loft.
Stars that had been visible moments ago disappeared behind a mass of heavy clouds.
She wiped tears from her cheeks.
The storm was coming faster than anyone had expected.
* * *
Boone tore out of the house in time to see the barn door slam with such force that it bounced open again. He ran across the yard feeling the first drops of icy rain hit him in the face.
Lightning blasted a hilltop in the distance.
Rushing into the barn, he bolted the door against the rising wind. “Melinda!”
He didn’t see her but he heard her weeping.
The wrenching cry cut him to the quick. If there was one person in the world he did not want to hurt, one above all others who did not deserve it, it was his sweet, brave bride.
Hustling up the ladder rungs two at a time, he came over the top to find her laying facedown on their straw bed.
Kneeling beside her, he touched her hair where it curled down her back. She had no way of knowing the number of times he’d imagined giving her pleasure on this bed. Never once had he wanted to bring her tears.
Curse him for being the one to cause this anguish. He gathered her up, bent his head over hers, rocking.
“Honey, I’m sorry, so very sorry.”
“Why is Stanley and Trudy’s future more important than ours?”
It felt as if he’d been gut shot seeing the anguish on her face, the way her arms hugged her middle instead of him.
Because they had one, he thought, but figured that was something she didn’t need to hear.
“If the way we feel about e
ach other was the only thing that mattered, life would be a mite easier.” He kissed the top of her head and pulled his arms tighter around her. If only he could shut out the world as easily as he’d locked the barn door. “I never expected to love you so much—
“Hell, that’s a bald lie. I reckon I should have known it could happen from the first. You were so beautiful, Melinda. So perfect, that I couldn’t figure out what a lady like you was doing at my trial. I haven’t been able to accept you and me together and it’s because I was afraid of it ending this way.”
“Why, Boone?” Her voice cracked on a sob. Her despair, the hitch of her shoulders, plowed into his heart because his Melinda never cried. “I don’t understand why it has to end at all.”
“I won’t say why, but I reckon I don’t need to.”
She shoved away from him. Wriggling out of his embrace, she knelt on the bed, her fists curled on her thighs.
“You are not going to die!” Her breath came in fast, hard gulps. “Don’t send me away. I’ll fight. So will Stanley.”
“I know you want to, but my attention would be on protecting you. I’ll have a better chance on my own.”
“You won’t! I’m not helpless and I don’t need protecting. I’ll do what’s needed. Just because I’ve never killed a man doesn’t mean I wouldn’t do it.”
“Brave words. I believe you mean them. But I’ve seen men who are used to killing hesitate. A half a second is all it is between life and death. You’ve seen it.”
“I won’t hesitate.”
“Look.” He reached toward her then let his hand drop when she turned her cheek away from his caress. “I’m not saying you won’t be called upon to fire your gun, just that it won’t be in my defense.”
“There are three men to watch out for Giselle and the baby. Even Trudy is a fair shot.”
“Trudy hits one can out of ten.” He folded his arms across his chest, hoping he looked more commanding than he felt. “If you believe the men can shoot any better, you’re fooling yourself.”
She looked up, silently staring at the rafters—or an abandoned bird’s nest, he couldn’t be sure. Hell, she was probably looking at his cold, dead body.
A sudden deluge of rain hit the roof. It slammed against the walls, made the mule stomp in his stall and bray.
“Honey, those innocent lives mean something. Think of the baby. She deserves her shot at life. I know you believe that.”
Melinda covered her upturned face with her hands. He thought she might be praying. He hoped she was praying, for him, for them all.
With a huff, a sigh, she lowered her hands. She stared at him, resignation tugging her mouth down at the corners.
“I’ll do as you ask, Boone, because I love you and because, as much as I hate it to be so, you are right.”
Thunder pummeled the roof hard enough to sprinkle dust from the rafters down upon their heads.
“I want one thing in return,” she added once the pounding rolled toward the east. She wiped the tears from her face, sniffed. “If I’m to be a widow, don’t leave me a virgin. I want— I need my husband.”
She was asking him to cross the one line he had vowed that he would not. The line that he had crossed so many times in his mind.
“When this is over if—”
“If you leave me untouched, it never will be over for me.”
“I’m a dirty outlaw, Melinda, not nearly good enough for you.”
All of a sudden she started unbuttoning her dress. It was unlikely, but he thought she was cussing under her breath. Heedlessly, she tossed petticoats and whatever those other frilly things were, around the loft.
“What’s that you’re saying?” he asked.
“A string of curse words.”
Angry curse words, if he heard right.
While he watched, spellbound, she stripped down to her skin.
“How dare you say you fell in love with me the first time you saw me! That I was perfect! Look at me, Boone Walker! Look past this!” She circled her hand in front of her face. “Can’t you see me? I’m a woman like any other. Knock me off the damned pedestal!”
Breathless in her rage, her undeniably-perfect-in-every-way chest heaved with exertion and emotion. A fine sheen of sweat glittered on her skin.
A woman like any other? No.
“Why are you smiling?” She fired the question at him.
“You aren’t a woman like any other, at least not like any I’ve ever watched undress. But then I’ve never had one take off her clothes with such...” He gestured with his hands, following the path of her clothing. “Abandon.”
“None of them were your legally wed wife. No doubt they had more time than I do. But since you’ve brought them up, did any of them ever tell you that you were not good enough for them?”
He shook his head, feeling that he’d been backed onto a twig suspended over a vast chasm and that it was cracking. How was a man to fight the greatest temptation of his life when his woman armed herself with a naked body, an extremely seductive naked body?
“Because it wasn’t true!”
“They were whores. They didn’t care.”
“I care, Boone.” She canceled the distance between them by grabbing a hank of his hair in her small, fair fist. She pulled him toward her. “That man you think wasn’t good enough for me is gone. The woman you held in such false esteem, she never existed.”
She drew him to within an inch of her lips.
“Make love to me, Boone.”
“What if I leave you with a child to raise on your own?”
“I will not allow you to leave me.”
“No...” He’d do his damnedest not to die, especially since she was offering him so much to live for. “I don’t reckon you will.”
A frizzle of electricity skittered over the barn roof. A blue-white blaze illuminated the loft at the same time the thunderclap exploded across the paddock.
Already on hands and knees, Boone crawled forward. Melinda fell backward onto the straw. She reached up, touching the back of his neck to pull him down.
He resisted for a heartbeat, but only that.
This moment seemed a miracle. Life, he was coming to believe, was full of them. But the amazing thing was that he, Boone Walker, had been granted one.
Taking her hand from his neck, he kissed it then set it over her heart. He lifted up, his weight balanced on his knees.
Straddling her hips, he tugged his shirt off over his head. He shoved down his pants and drawers, wriggled out of them then tossed them with the same carelessness as Melinda had tossed hers.
The difference was, along with his boots, he tossed over the old Boone, the unworthy one.
A new man—the one Melinda had recognized beneath the lies even when he hadn’t—this one was going to have his wife.
Skimming his flesh over hers, he breathed in the scent of her skin where her hair fell away from her neck.
She gripped his hips, her fingers digging into his butt while she pressed him close. Her belly was hot velvet against his erection.
“Slow down, honey.” Not that he wanted to. Everything in him wanted to ride her hard and fast. “You’re new to this.”
“I’ve dreamed if it often enough.” Her breath beat against the hollow of his throat, thick, labored. “I can’t imagine I was far off the mark.”
“It might—”
“Hurt? So I’ve read.”
She nipped his ear, tangled her fingers in his hair and pulled him into a kiss that kicked his heart. Knowing that in spite of what she said and what he hoped, the first time for them might also be the last.
She must have felt him doubt, hesitate.
“No,” she whispered over the steady drum of rain above their heads. “This isn’t the end.”
“We will have tomorrow, honey,” he whispered. “I reckon I just needed my wife to set me straight on it.”
Sweet, lazy seduction would have its time.
But not now.
While the storm broke around the barn, Melinda demanded his surrender.
This was one life sentence he would no longer fight.
He nuzzled the side of her breast with his cheek then closed his mouth over her nipple. Her fullness cushioned his teeth, the swollen berry at the tip twisted against his tongue.
She lifted her hips against him, impatient.
“Almost,” he answered and then pressed his pelvis against her belly to still her.
With his thumb and finger, he twisted the nipple he had just suckled, watching the moisture from his mouth glisten in a flash of lightning.
Rising to his knees, he lifted her hips, spread her thighs, stroking, kneading. He wondered if feeling her smooth, firm flesh under his hands would always be this soul-shattering.
It would, of course, because he was touching Melinda and, from this day on, he accepted that she was his.
His heart pounded, his pulse beat in his fingertips when he stroked her swollen feminine crease. She took in a slow breath, let it out in a moan.
For once his Melinda seemed to have no words, but her eyes spoke clearly enough. It was time and past to make her the wife of his heart, of his body.
In a half crouch, with one hand under her buttocks, he nudged her with the head of his penis.
Had this been a leisurely wedding night, if time had been on their side, he would have entered her slowly.
But this was not, and his wife knew it. She arched, taking him inside her.
Her languid expression sharpened, her pretty eyes widened, but only for an instant.
She blinked in long, slow surrender then fastened her gaze on him while he rode her.
He couldn’t look away, she would not let him. Even in the moment when he lost himself, in the moment when she throbbed around him, even then their eyes held, seeing the future in each other.
He would live through the coming hours. In this moment of surrender, she handed him her heart. In return, she took his life.