She sighed heavily, prettily. “You were always so much better at compromising than I was. Still are.” Then she shook her head. “But no.”
His heart stopped. “No?”
“No. If for some reason we have to leave Montana, we’ll decide together where to go.” She folded her hands around the sides of his neck. “Because it won’t matter to me. I now know where my true home is. Where I’ll always be safe and loved. It’s right here, in your arms.”
“You do fit nicely here,” Brett said, taking her waist and lifting her, long beaded dress and all, against his length. Then he kissed her like there was no tomorrow, even though he knew there would be a lifetime of tomorrows.
* * *
It was later that afternoon, as they walked into the church, just he and Ester and their family members, as well as the minister of course, that he thought of her compromise again.
He pulled her aside. “Are you sure?”
“Yes,” she said. “I’m sure. I’ve always wanted to marry you.”
The unabashed love glowing about her had him looking forward to married life more than ever. He kissed her nose. “No, I mean the private wedding. You always wanted a big one, with the entire town in attendance.”
She shook her head. “The only thing that truly matters is it’s you I’m marrying.” After a brief kiss, she took his hand and started walking toward the front of the church. “Besides, the only reason I wanted a big wedding was to prove to every other girl in town that you would forever be mine.”
He laughed. “There was never any doubt about that.”
The ceremony was short, but reverent. To all present, it was as if the very heavens opened up to bless their union. Afterward, Galen insisted upon the entire wedding party going to the hotel for supper.
News spreads fast in a town the size of Cutter’s Corner, and half of the residents beat them to the hotel. Brett should have known these people would want to be a part of the event: Ester had been a part of their lives forever, and that, too, had him questioning the compromise—if it could be called that because he wasn’t giving up anything.
He stopped shy of entering the dining room to ask her, “What made you change your mind?”
She ran a single finger down the line of buttons on his shirt. “You.”
“But I didn’t do anything.”
“You never stopped loving me.”
His throat constricted. “And I never will.”
“I know,” she whispered as her lips met his briefly before she tugged him forward.
There was a cake, and gifts, and Frank Hespers and his brother Owen had their banjo and washboard for the folks to dance to after the tables were pushed aside. Holding Ester as they danced, knowing she was his wife, had Brett strung tighter than Frank’s banjo strings, and it was in the middle of the dance floor when the strain of wanting her became too much.
While swaying her hips beneath all that white lace and beads seductively against his, she licked the sensitive skin next to his ear. “I want you to know,” she whispered, “there will be no compromising upstairs. You will definitely be taking your pants off.”
A charge as strong as dynamite hit his loins. “That’s it,” he declared, and scooped her into his arms.
The band stopped as he headed for the doorway and staircase beyond, and then Ester, sweet, innocent Ester—as most of Cutter’s Corner referred to her—pulled his hat off and waved it in the air like a cowhand.
“Yee-haw!” she shouted before she flung the hat into the crowd.
Hoots and hollers echoed up the stairway and down the hall, as did the music, which started to play again, while he carried her to their room, grinning the entire way. Once there, unfastening more buttons than he’d ever seen in his life, he nibbled the back of her neck.
“Ester,” he said softly.
“Hmm?”
“From this moment on…” He paused to kiss the space between her shoulder blades, smiling to himself as she moaned. “You are never…” This time he tugged her backward, just enough to press her sweet little posterior between his hips for a moment.
She moaned again and wiggled against him.
“…allowed to wear anything with more than five buttons.” He finished with a groan.
Her giggle filled the room, and swirled around his already overflowing heart.
“All right,” she answered. “I promise.” Tossing a sweet, private smile over her shoulder, she added, “You should try being on this side of all those buttons.”
A tangle of emotions sprang up inside Brett. Not the least of these was desperation, for he was desperate to be inside her—had been since he was about sixteen and had come to understand the glory that would be. There was love, too, inside him, and overwhelming tenderness for this infinitely precious woman who was now finally, truly and forever his wife.
The last button finally gave way, and he spun her slowly, affectionately, so he could gaze into those flower-blue eyes and bask in the devotion they showered over him.
“I love you, Ester. I know I’ve said that a hundred times over, but it’s true, always has been. There hasn’t been a moment, not one, when I haven’t felt that way.” In awe, as he was, his voice sounded raspy, like a wheel needing grease. The music from below filtered in, and he shook his head. She was giving up so much, while he wasn’t. “We don’t have to leave here. I’ll—”
Her smile grew as she placed four fingers against his lips. “I love you, Brett,” she said, sternly, boldly, as those blue eyes captured his. “I have for years and years. And yet, in all those years, I never took into consideration all the concessions you made for me.” Her hand slid across his cheek. “I want to go to Montana. With all my heart.”
She could never know how beautiful she looked right then. Her eyes had always told him exactly what she was feeling, thinking. Five years ago they’d held a fear he couldn’t fathom, but right now, besides love and devotion, they held truth, and his own smile grew as he recognized excitement. For the future. For Montana.
He picked her up and spun her around the room until they were both dizzy and laughing loudly enough the people below most likely heard. As he set her down, she cupped his jaw. “I’ve wanted you to do that since the moment you arrived home.”
“Well, why didn’t you tell me that, Mrs. Richards?” He picked up and spun her again, kissing her this time.
She was the one to break the kiss. “I’ve wanted to be called that for so many years,” she said as he set her down and her fingers started unbuttoning his shirt. “I’ve even practiced writing it. Over and over again.”
He caught her chin, dazzled by the smile on her lips. “You wanted to be twirled around, and called Mrs. Richards. What else have you wanted?”
Her grin turned into that tempting smirk as she took a step back and dropped her shoulders, one at a time, to let the dress fall away. As the material, yards and yards of it, pooled around her feet, she asked, “What do you think?”
Brett became speechless, a touch dumbfounded. He’d unbuttoned the dress, kissed bare skin, but hadn’t realized… “You haven’t been wearing anything beneath—”
“Nope.” Stepping out of the folds, she reached down and pulled the white slippers off her feet. “Not even socks.”
“Aw, woman,” he replied, resting his hands on the perfect slopes of her slender shoulders. “You certainly are something.” His hands slid down her arms and then back up the satin skin of her sides until his palms cupped the sides of her breasts and the pads of his thumbs found the nipples. “And the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”
Her beauty did amaze him, and he hoped she’d never guess how nervous he was. Not at taking her, but at being all she deserved.
She pushed the shirt off his shoulders and then reaching for his pants, said, “I’m not going to be the only one naked this time.”
Within an instant, he was as bare as she, and they fell upon the bed, kissing and touching and loving. Loving like they both had dreame
d of for years. He knew that about her, knew years ago he could have taken her, had her, but only because she loved him and he her. Years of knowing that, wanting that, had his desires peaking, but the years had also given him patience—patience that would pay off tonight.
Brett took his time, exploring her fully, and glorified in her explorations, which threatened to snap his resolve, especially when she folded one hand around him, stroking him to new heights.
He inched his way toward the foot of the bed while kissing strategic spots, swirling his tongue over the silken skin of her belly and kissing the golden curls lower yet. Then as she arched her hips and softly cried his name, he settled his face between her legs and lifted her to lick the length of her core. She quivered and moaned and he tasted her fully.
Her blatant pleasure was almost his undoing. He drew upon every ounce of restraint he’d ever had and used them all to carry her to the peak, where she was calling his name and her legs were stiffening over his shoulders.
Ester was sagging into the mattress when Brett positioned himself over her, and though she was still floating in a misty dreamland, she understood things were far from over. “Now?” she asked, thrilled the moment had finally arrived.
“Now,” he answered.
Those beautiful brown eyes, full of love, also had a touch of apprehension. She smiled, loving him all the more for his tender concern, and knowing above all else he’d never put her in danger. Especially not of losing him.
“I’ve waited my whole life for this,” she whispered, arching her center toward the part of him she’d found so fascinating a short time ago. There was a touch of fear inside her, she had to admit, for he seemed so large compared to her.
“I’ll go slow,” he whispered. “But it may still hurt.”
“So I’ve been told, but that’ll be brief,” she assured, not wanting him to change his mind. Anticipation was renewing itself inside her, and the pleasure she’d already experienced said what was to follow would be worth any pain.
With one hand he guided himself into her entrance, and the connection, the feel of him gliding into her, was profound. Her hips strained toward him, but his hands on her waist kept her from moving as he withdrew and entered again.
A whimper bubbled in the back of her throat. Brett had always taken extra precautions where she was concerned, to assure her safety or well-being, and was doing so again. She understood that, yet his gentleness in withholding the pain was torturous.
Slowly, evenly, he withdrew and moved forward again, and then again, going a bit deeper each time. The rhythm was enticing, had her hips rolling to meet his, and an eagerness rose from her core that soon had her breath quickening. She felt a flash of discomfort as he broke through her maidenhead, but she was already set on her journey and barely flinched, wanting, needing to reach that beautiful, wonderful, yet unexplainable destination he’d taken her to earlier.
The voyage this time was brighter, stronger, for Brett was with her. The muscles of his back, beneath her fingers, were rock hard, and his breathing was as ragged as hers as he held her, kissed her and propelled her forward, faster and faster.
Ester was at that point where something had to give. “Brett,” she cried, unable to breathe. “Brett.”
“I know, darling. I’m with you,” he answered. “I’m with you.”
He was, and the fascinating force between them exploded, leaving them clinging to one another, kissing and gasping each other’s names as astonishing fulfillment sparked from one to the other and back again.
It was all she ever imagined. All she ever dreamed. For Brett was with her. Would be forever.
* * *
Years and years later, Ester stood on the front porch of the sprawling ranch house, where they’d raised five children, staring at yet another beautiful Montana sunrise. She’d never tire of them, of the way the sun turned the earth a brilliant blaze of colors before it rose higher to splay life-giving light across acres and acres of the most wonderful ground on earth. She smiled as the light bounced off the buildings, one of which was the carriage house Brett had built her shortly after her arrival, and her smile increased as warm hands circled her from behind.
“Morning, sweets.”
She leaned into the kiss he placed upon the side of her neck. “Good morning, my love.”
“You’re up early,” he said, pulling her back to lean against his solid strength.
“Excitement, I guess.”
“It’ll be good to see them.”
He was speaking of their oldest son, John, who was named after Brett’s father, and John’s wife, Suzanne. They were coming home from Baltimore, to stay. Along with the latest Richards child. A boy. Brett. Named after his grandfather. Last winter Ester had traveled to Baltimore, along with Brett, to be at hand when the baby was born, while John was still in medical school.
She’d traveled a lot over the years, but was always anxious to get back home. To Montana.
Spinning around, she pulled Brett’s unbuttoned shirt wide and slide her hands around his waist. Other than a few gray hairs near his temples and a couple more laugh lines around his eyes, which made him all the more handsome, her hero hadn’t changed over the years. “Have I ever told you how exciting it is to sleep with a grandpa?”
He laughed. “Woman, you never fail to amaze me.” After a good, solid kiss, which never failed to stir her, he said, “We have time if you want to show me.”
“I could do that,” she answered immediately. “I could do that.”
* * * * *
If you liked this story, look for more Western romance by Lauri Robinson on sale now from Harlequin Historical Undone wherever ebooks are sold:
Wedding Night with the Ranger
Her Midnight Cowboy
Nights with the Outlaw
Disobeying the Marshal
Testing the Lawman’s Honor
The Sheriff’s Last Gamble
About the Author
Lauri Robinson’s chosen genre to write is western historical. When asked why, she says, “Because I know I wasn’t the only girl who wanted to grow up and marry Little Joe Cartwright.”
With a degree in early childhood education, Lauri has spent decades working in the non-profit field and claims once upon a time and happily ever after romance novels have always been a form of stress relief. When her husband suggested she write one, she took the challenge and has loved every minute of the journey.
Lauri lives in rural Minnesota where she and her husband spend every spare moment with their three grown sons and four grandchildren. She works part time, volunteers for several organizations, and is a diehard Elvis and NASCAR fan. Her favorite getaway location is the woods of northern Minnesota on the land homesteaded by her great-grandfather.
Enjoy more passion through the ages with the sensual Harlequin Historical UNDONE titles on sale now:
An Illicit Temptation by Jeannie Lin
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Taming the Highland Rogue by Terri Brisbin
A Pleasurable Shame by Linda Skye
To Rescue or Ravish? by Barbara Monajem
Flirting with Ruin by Marguerite Kaye
The Widow and the Rake by Lyn Stone
One Reckless Night by Helen Dickson
The Sheriff’s Last Gamble by Lauri Robinson
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ISBN: 978-14592-3891-6
What a Cowboy Wants
Copyright © 2012 by Lauri Robinson
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