Carole Howey - Sheik's Glory

by Carole Howey

  Seamus regaled the minister and the sheriff with another of his tales from the floor of the House, his long arms performing a graceful, if exaggerated, dance of dramatic interpretation.

  " . . . so I told my esteemed colleague, the distinguished congressman from Illinois . . ."

  Flynn shut him out again, nosing his own glass of brandy, his first, still half-full, as he leaned his elbow on the mantel. The last time he'd heard that particular fantasy, the congressman in question had been from Kentucky. Not for the first time, Flynn wondered what percentage of Seamus's anecdotes had long ago crossed the boundary between fact and invention. He wondered if Seamus himself knew anymore.

  A gentle tug on his sleeve pulled him away from Seamus's tired tale and into Missy's animated eyes.

  "Eldon has pulled out his pocket watch at least three times," she murmured in a voice as soft as the summer evening. "It's getting late, and you should be resting."

  As if he were an invalid. Well, he was, he realized, grimacing as a stab of pain reminded him. He mustered a smile for her tender concern and for her diplomacy. She wanted Seamus gone, it was plain. He abandoned his brandy glass on the mantelpiece in favor of caressing her cheek.

  "I'll kick Seamus out," he whispered, stealing another glance at his brother and the increasingly restive audience about him. "And I think I'll ask Rich to drive him back to town. He might be too drunk to find the way himself." Missy's look said what he knew she would never have allowed her lips to utter: would that be such a loss to the world or, more especially, to their little corner of it?

  "Might be?" Her echo was evidence of her skepticism.

  Flynn didn't want to burden his new bride with speculation about his brother's true condition, so he said nothing. Missy, he knew, worried sufficiently without his giving her just cause.

  "Where's Gideon?"

  "You know where he is." Flynn's reply was a gentle reprimand as he closed the bedroom door. Their bedroom door. "I guess you saw us from the window. He thinks it's quite a treat to be staying in the bunkhouse with the hands tonight. I doubt we'll ever get him back into his own room after this, unless he decides he misses the soft life." He chuckled.

  Missy felt warmed by the tranquil sound, despite her nervousness. "Then we're alone."

  "Yes. Except for Lucy, Jed, and Mrs. Fedderman downstairs, that is," he answered, tongue in cheek. "Why are you sitting up here in the dark?"

  He didn't add fully dressed, but Missy, tense in the rocking chair by the window, nevertheless heard the postscript. Her hands, already clenched together so tightly that they were stiff and aching, squeezed harder still.

  "I was I was waiting for you."

  She heard the creak of the floorboards and the thud of his boots on the rag rug in the dark room as he approached. "Well, I'm here now."

  Hushed as a night breeze, and just as soothing to her heated brow. Had she ever even dreamed of loving a man the way she loved Flynn? No, it had not been the sensible thing to do, and she'd always been practical.

  She wished she had spent more time dreaming about it, though, about what a man's love was and what it meant. If she had, she would not be so apprehensive now. So uncertain of herself, and of him.

  "You're quiet," he observed, resting his hands on her shoulders as he stood behind her chair.

  But her shoulders and the rest of her cried out with want at his touch. She was surprised that he could not hear it, or feel it through his long, strong, sensitive fingers. Love me, Flynn, it said. Please.

  "I’m I was thinking."

  "About what?" His fingers began a gentle massage, seductive in its artful artlessness.

  About Madeleine Deauville, she thought. About the underhanded thing I did to make sure you were mine, and that nobody's claim was greater.

  "Your shoulders are so tense!" His midnight-blue baritone was quiet with amazement and his massage deepened. "Relax, sweetheart. It's over. Everyone's gone. It's just us now."

  Just us. Just you and me, and a hundred secrets in between.

  Flynn's hands were gone, and Missy felt cold, despite the heat of the summer day lingering in the room. She wanted to call him back, but she stifled her request. The result was a whimper clogging her throat.

  "I'm just lighting a lamp," he assured her in answer to her unspoken query. There was no hint of amusement in his remark, thank heaven. Still, she felt foolish. She shrank deeper into the caned seat and kept her elbows tight at her sides.

  "No, don't, Flynn."

  I don't want you to see the guilt in my eyes.

  The ensuing silence told her he was considering her request.

  "All right." She felt the agreeable weight of his hands on her shoulders again. Agreeable, yet somehow reminding her of the burden she had taken upon herself . . .

  "You're restless," Flynn observed. "Why don't you get up and"

  "I'm not ready to go to bed yet," she blurted.

  "I was going to suggest you let me sit down there, and you could sit on my lap."

  There was only a trace of gentle amusement in Flynn's voice. Missy suspected he could not have prevented it. She felt so damnably, idiotically naive! Her face heated.

  "I’ll hurt you." Missy choked back a lot of pride to say it, but she was damned if she'd be the cause of any more wrong to Flynn than she already had been.

  He tapped lightly on her left shoulder and urged her to her feet with only his fingertips.

  "The day I can't hold my wife on my lap," he intoned, in a light, teasing tone for which she silently blessed him, "is the day I hope to leave this world for the next."

  Missy longed to give him a playful response, but she was feeling far from frolicsome and could think of none. He eased his long, lean frame into the chair stiffly and with a slight grimace. Doubt renewed, she looked at him.

  "Well, come on." He embellished his already attractive invitation with a tender smile, a beckoning wave, and two pats of his lap. "I won't bite. I promise."

  Missy could not long sustain the heat of his cobalt eyes; nor could she deny that she wanted, more than anything, to feel him around her in a comforting embrace, even if that embrace would surely lead to other things. Especially if it led to other things.

  She tried to will herself lighter as she gingerly settled herself onto his lap. She meant to keep a distance between them, as much to protect his sore ribs as to punish herself, but the chair had other ideas. It rocked back with their combined weight and she was pressed against him, her shoulder to his breast. He let out a soft grunt of surprise.

  "Oh, I've hurt you!"

  Missy tried to get up, but his strong arms held her fast against him.

  "No, you haven't," he denied on a breath that tickled her ear. "I just wasn't prepared for it. I'm fine. Just sit still. Sit here. With me."

  His invitation was the most seductive one she'd ever received. She snuggled closer to him. He felt so good; so warm and so strong. He smelled faintly of fresh tobacco, and the scent of the single shot of brandy he'd consumed still tinged his breath.

  He smelled like heaven. Like a man. She closed her eyes as a sigh took her breath away.

  "Unnh."

  There was no mistaking the discomfort in that sound. Stricken, Missy pushed away from him.

  "No, sweetheart," he growled, pulling her close again with unarguable authority. "Stay here." He punctuated his request with a kiss behind her ear that inspired a fluid warmth along her spine like heated sugar syrup running straight down into her loins. "Right here.'' He nipped her earlobe, then licked it to ease the thrilling pinch that resulted. "With me." His kiss traveled along her neck and over the soft ridge of her chin. "Now."

  Now.

  His shoulder supported her head, as her own neck seemed incapable of such exertion. His mouth tried hers ever so slightly, lips brushing lips, and her jaw relaxed as if he'd drugged her with a single, simple taste. Her mouth welcomed his, and she delighted in his breathless groan of delight. Or was that pain again? She fidgeted.

 
; "No," he murmured, then sent the tip of his tongue on a slow, torturous mission along her lower lip. "It's good." He paused for breath. "So good. Be still. Be very still. . . ."

  It was good. Her left hand snaked its way about his neck until she found the thick hair that curled over his shirt. Soft as a baby's. She could play in it forever. She would, now that she had the right. She wanted to touch his neck, but the shirt hindered her attempt, despite the absence of a real collar.

  "Here."

  Flynn worked the button at his throat, his lips poised a breath away from hers. His eyes were smoky sapphires. They warmed her.

  "Touch me," he invited her, brushing the corner of his mouth against her lips. "And let me touch you. God, I want to, Missy. I've wanted to for as long as I can remember."

  A silly giggle escaped her lips.

  "When I was covered with muck in Glory's stall in Louisville?"

  He laughed once, breathlessly, taking her chin in his fingers.

  "Seeing as how you seem to spend half your life up to your elbows in one mess or another, I can't imagine that would surprise you so much."

  "It doesn't, I guess," she surprised herself by confessing. "It's just that I would never have taken you for a man who likes to wrestle pigs."

  "Missy, what a comparison!" He sounded appalled. "I'd take you to task for insulting my wife like that, but seeing as you are my wife, that makes it a bit awkward, to say the least."

  Missy felt her face heat. Madeleine or her daughter might have made such a remark about her, she knew. She concentrated on the appealing cleft of Flynn's throat.

  "It's only an expression," she told him, wishing she hadn't uttered it. She'd just begun to feel easy with him, and words from her own mouth were causing her to stiffen up again with dark thoughts of Madeleine and her own dishonesty.

  "You're damned hard to tease, Mrs. Muldaur," he scolded her with a gentle shake of her shoulders. "You're always so serious, especially about yourself. I see I have a lot of hard work ahead of me, mellowing you."

  Missy managed a grin, and she was glad of the darkness in the room that hid her blush.

  "I'll try not to be too slow to learn," she ventured, drawing her finger downward from the tip of his fine nose over his lips.

  His mouth widened slightly in a rapt grin that pulled her even closer than his embrace.

  "Oh, take as long as you like," he allowed generously, covering her touring finger with his hand in a gentle but possessive grasp. "I've found over the years that the sweetest lessons take the longest time to teach."

  The Missy of six months before, she realized, nestling closer to his neck, would have run in terror at such a suggestion from a man. Flynn had already taught her much in that time, though, and she found herself eager to learn even more.

  There was a sharp hiss of breath, ending in a hoarse groan.

  Missy leapt up from Flynn's lap so quickly that she nearly fell backward. Flynn's head was back, his eyes were closed, and his handsome features were taut with pain.

  "I'm sorry, oh, I'm so sorry, Flynn," she wailed, kneeling beside the rocker in baste. "I have hurt you. Oh, damn. I"

  "No, no." Flynn's attempted smile fell short of convincing her. "You didn't. I'm fine. Fine" His repetition was cut short by a wince. "Damn it."

  "That does it." Missy stood up. "To bed," she ordered him. ''At once. You're obviously in no condition for much of anything but rest." She felt a queer mingling of relief and disappointment at the postponement of her wedding night, but she could not deny that she also felt perfectly at ease dictating a prescription for Flynn's recovery.

  "I don't aim to make a practice of being bedridden, nor of allowing my wife to boss me around," Flynn growled at her from his chair, and although there was a twinkle in his eye as he said it, she knew he wasn't more than half joking. She met his teasing look boldly.

  "There's an expression cowboys use," she told him with a shade of tartness, taking hold of his hands. "'Don't squat with your spurs on.' It's good advice."

  "I know another expression," he drawled, getting to his feet with her help. "'It doesn't take too many inches to make a wife a ruler.'"

  But he allowed her to lead him to the bed.

  "I feel like a damned old man," he growled, stepping slowly. "Next thing you know, you'll be serving me up curdled milk with a spoon."

  "If you don't take care of yourself, I just might," she scolded him as she lit the small bedside lamp. "Now hold still while I get your buttons."

  Flynn tried not to think about the fact that Missy was undressing him there in the bedroom, but as her gentle fingers undid the buttons of his shirt from the throat down with ease, it became increasingly difficult to think of anything else. She went on talking to him in a singsong way, the way she might have addressed Gideon, but Flynn did not hear the words. His ears were too full of the hammering of his pulse. The clean scent of her hair was like roses blooming in the next yard over.

  But there were no roses in Dakota, he knew. There was only Missy.

  She was no longer speaking. She wasn't unfastening his buttons anymore either, but he had no idea how long ago she'd stopped that. It might have been moments or hours. She'd run out of shirt, in any case, and he felt her short, fast breaths tease the hair on his bared chest.

  His trousers were unbearably tight. He realized, closing his eyes, that broken ribs or no broken ribs, there were some other parts of him that were going to feel a whole lot worse this night before they felt better.

  "You're not finished," he observed, his voice lower and quieter than it had any business being.

  She stole a glance at him. It was just long enough for him to see the maidenly hesitation in her amethyst eyes.

  "Can't you . . ." Her hand moved toward the buttons of his trousers, but retreated again quickly. "You can do that yourself."

  He caught it. "Help me."

  "Flynn"

  "Please, Missy." It came out as a breathless croak. He wondered if she would interpret his plea as a sign of pain. She'd be right, but the pain was farther south of where it had been earlier.

  "I’m afraid."

  He knew what the admission cost her, and he loved her all the more for it.

  "I know. Don't be, sweetheart. It's all right. It's just us here now."

  "But I'll hurt you."

  I'll hurt you, too, he thought, but could not bring himself to say. Besides, Missy was not ignorant, even if she was inexperienced. In answer, he placed his hand on hers and guided it to his waist.

  He watched her swallow. Then, with one false movement, she placed her fingers at the topmost button. Their tips pressed lightly against his abdomen, inspiring a renewed shiver of want within him. His mouth went dry and he clenched his hands, praying for control.

  "Flynn, I can't." The anguish in Missy's cry as she turned away from him was more than silly virgin reticence. And it had something to do with his brother. He sensed it. Damn him, what had Seamus said to her? Flynn took hold of Missy's shoulders, wanting to kill his brother.

  "What is it, Miss?" he coaxed in her ear. "What's wrong?"

  Missy said something he could not make out.

  "What?"

  "I've misled you." A whisper.

  "What? How?" What the devil was she talking about?

  "Antoinette," she breathed, her shoulders sagging in his grasp. "And Madeleine. I went to see them in town yesterday."

  Flynn's stomach turned to a jagged chunk of ice. He longed to speak, but he knew he would say far too much if he did. He remained silent, waiting for Missy to say something, dreading what he might hear.

  "What did you do afterward?"

  "I meant to confront them," she explained, sounding sturdier. "Madeleine and Antoinette, that is. I meant to discover from them exactly what hold they had over you. But when I finally saw them, I found I didn't really want to know. And that it wasn't important to me after all. What was important was that I loved you, and that I would dodo anything to keep you. Even deceive you. I arrang
ed for the wedding to be held here today because I was afraid of them, and of their power over you. I felt that if I waited until you were healed, it might be . . . too late."

  Her last words died, and her head drooped like a wilting flower. Flynn, numb, slipped one hand into hers.

  "Missy," he began, but he had nowhere to go, so he fell silent again.

  "I accused you of deceiving me," she said after an empty moment, withdrawing her hand from his. "Yet I tricked you in the most unspeakable manner by marrying you under these circumstances. I can't ask your forgiveness, for I can't even forgive myself. But I am sorry, Flynn. Truly. Tomorrow I'll go to Rev. Whitmire and Sheriff Garlock and ask them both to draw up an annulment. That way, if you really want to, then you can . . ."