“You’re wrong, as usual. I never lied to you this morning. I know you’re not thinking clearly now, but I do remember every word. I told you if you married me, I would promise never to set foot in your room on the Reina again. But, Lacey, that is all I promised.”
It was said with such cold finality that she felt her head clear. She would never admit that he spoke the truth. “You are a conniving liar. Evan said I couldn’t trust you. You know that wasn’t the promise I meant to have from you at all.”
“And I’m tried of hearing you swear at me. But since,” he stated with exaggerated patience, “I can well understand your frustration in being bested, princess, I’m giving you one last warning. Now, stop it.”
“I won’t. He warned me. They all tried to warn me.”
“Then you should have listened to them. And that’s enough.”
Before she could avoid him, he had grabbed her wrist and half-pulled, half-dragged her around to the back of the building. Someone had thoughtfully left a lantern burning in the small window; its feeble light, Lacey noticed, was barely enough to see with. He pulled her against him with a jerk, her “I don’t want—” sharply cut off.
“Behave yourself. At least till we’re in our room. Just the way you keep reminding me of broken promises,” he stressed in a harsh tone, “I’ll thank you to remember your own. I believe you were to appear in public as the perfect wife. So far,” he added jeeringly, “you’re not doing a very good job of it. If this is the way you keep your word, princess, can you with any honesty ask me to keep mine? Sometimes, Lacey, you leave me to wonder—”
“Wonder all you want.” Her thoughts deserted her, refusing, under his glare, to form the caustic words she longed to fling at him. “How can you expect me to keep my word, Rafe, when you obviously intend to break yours?”
Grim amusement twitched the corner of his lips, but that half smile never reached his eyes. “I haven’t broken my word, Lacey. At least, not yet.”
With that threat hanging between them, he opened the door and pushed her inside, his hand firmly placed in the center of her back. Lacey was surprised to see there were still a few people milling about the long hall.
“Smile, princess, and show me how you keep your word, or I might change my mind.”
They started up the stairs, Rafe constantly nudging her upward as he answered a few drunken remarks. Once clear of their sight, he strided down the hall, pulling her along until they were in the back of the house. In the dim light Lacey saw him take the key from his vest pocket and open the door, ignoring her resistance to gently push her into the room.
Silent and sullen, her head aching unbearably, Lacey watched his shadow spring to life when he lit the lamp. He hesitated a moment, and then to her surprise, Rafe returned to the door.
“Where do you think you’re going, Rafe?”
“I thought you would be glad to see me go. But if you insist—”
“I don’t,” she replied scathingly, turning her back on him. She could feel his eyes boring into her and prayed that he would leave—and quickly. The seconds stretched out as they stood there, Lacey holding her breath, not daring to look at him. She admitted to herself she was frightened of what she would see in his eyes.
Chapter 20
The quiet closing of the door behind her made Lacey spin around and she grabbed hold of a chair to steady herself. Heat flushed her, and she swayed dizzily on her feet. She stifled the urge to run, for she knew that he would come after her. And then what? Thinking made her head pound.
Lacey gazed at the bed, thought of being in it when Rafe returned, if he did, to prove how unconcerned she was, and began to undress.
The thought was easier than her attempts. Struggling with the long line of tiny buttons at the back of her gown, she felt tears of angry frustration start, and with a tug born of rage for Rafe, she tore the back of the gown open. The innate piece of fragile material was the recipient of her despairing fury. Leaving it where she had kicked it away from her, Lacey’s unsteady fingers fumbled with the ribbons holding her petticoats in place. Swearing as each was undone, she tossed them behind her, not caring where they landed, until she was exhausted by her efforts and stood clad in soft cotton drawers and a short satin camisole.
She managed to raise her eyes, her head thundering wickedly with the motion, and realized she faced an oval mirror over the dressing table. The sight of herself disheveled, while the soft curves of her body were clearly defined by the lamp’s warm glow, made her lean forward.
“A hell of a way to spend your wedding night, my dear. But remember, you did Sy Garrett and the Reina proud today.”
She raised her hand to her lips, caught sight of the golden band glinting in the light. She spared a thought of where Rafe had taken the ring from before all her despair focused on that bit of gold.
She pulled it off and threw it across the room. The small act of defiance seemed to drain her, and she stumbled to the bed to remove the counterpane, only to spin dizzily around at the sound of the door opening.
“You!” she gasped at the sight of Rafe framed in the doorway, a bottle held high in one hand. She saw that his string tie was gone and his shirt was opened to the waist, as was his vest. She didn’t realize she had grabbed the quilt in a protective move to shield herself until he mentioned it.
“It’s rather foolish, you know,” he mocked, motioning with his free hand toward her wary pose. “You’re hiding nothing I haven’t already seen, Lacey.”
“Don’t remind me. What are you doing here? I thought—”
“I don’t give a damn what you thought. I’m tired of hearing what you think and believe. I have no intention of spending my wedding night bedding down with a bunch of drunks in the livery. Besides…”
It was the narrowing of his eyes moving slowly over her in a heated caress that freed her tongue. “That’s good enough for the likes of you. All right, stay. But I won’t spend another minute in this room with you.”
“Then don’t. There’s plenty of men in this town, so I’m sure you can find one to ride roughshod over.” He slammed the door closed with his heel and, disregarding her wide-eyed stare, crossed the room and set the bottle down on the small table with a decided bang.
His gunbelt followed, and Lacey irrationally thought of the scar he would leave on the wood. The jacket came off next, and she found herself backing away until she pressed against the wall. He quickly shed the vest and tossed it on the chair. She almost heaved a relieved sigh to see that he had stopped undressing, but frowned when he poured himself a drink.
“Still searching for courage, Rafe?”
“The only … ‘courage,’ as you call it,” he stated coldly, facing her, “that I expect to find in this bottle, bruja, is the type that will stop me from putting my hands on you.” He knew she saw the flare of desire in his eyes, even as his words denied it. He’d made no effort to hide what he felt. She sagged weakly against the wall, and he found himself saying, “Go to sleep, princess. I won’t touch you.”
The chilled finality in his voice did not invite her to question him. She scurried under the covers, holding her breath, not quite trusting him. But her eyes never left him, and she knew as he turned his back on her when he caught sight of the torn, crumpled gown.
She stifled a gasp of terror as he kicked it aside. Lacey heard the ring roll across the floor. His profile was enough to tell her once again that Rafe was capable of murder. And now that furious, murderous contempt was directed at her.
Lacey longed to whisper she was sorry, but his rage was replaced by a mask of indifference.
“I’m sorry you valued the ring so little, princess. It was all I had of my mother.” He leaned down to pick it up and slipped it into his pants pocket. Without another word he pulled out the chair and sat down.
She didn’t dare breathe deeply, much less thi
nk to speak.
He sat with his back toward her, and the only motion Lacey saw was the refilling of the glass coming more and more frequently, until he pushed it aside and drank deeply from the bottle. She was amazed at the amount of liquor he consumed all night and now this. Rafe didn’t appear to be drunk. That convinced her that she really didn’t know this man she once believed she loved and had married. Her eyes began to ache, and Lacey never remembered closing them, but she did.
It was the sound of her soft, even breathing that made Rafe finally stop. He stood up, jerking off his shirt, boots, and pants, his eyes never leaving her.
The sudden feel of his weight on the bed made her eyes open. Rafe had left the lamp lit and was leaning over her. She refused to look at him and stared at the dark curling hair on his chest. The line it formed narrowed as she gazed lower, and Lacey closed her eyes. She should have known he was lying! He waited until she relaxed her guard so be could catch her unaware, but her arms and legs felt leaden when she tried to move.
Rafe drew her resisting body against his own, placing her head on his shoulder, his arms holding her securely. “Go back to sleep. I only want to hold you.”
She didn’t struggle, but as he held her, it was no longer Rafe that she didn’t trust. It was herself. His hands seemed to burn her where they held her. The lean hardness of the leg he pressed over her own sent a shiver of warmth through her. She could feel her blood surging, its tempo matching his rapid heartbeat where the soft flesh of her breast pressed against him. She flushed as her own breathing quickened, knowing he had to hear it.
Hoping to lull her back to sleep, Rafe cursed himself. He had thought he had given her enough time to be deeply asleep before he came to lie beside her. He was wrong. Even as he had tried to drown his rage at seeing his mother’s ring thrown carelessly on the floor, he knew he couldn’t blame her entirely. He could well imagine the fury that prompted Lacey.
The ache inside him grew until his lips flattened against his clenched teeth. He should have stayed in the saloon. At least the women there had been willing for his attention. But he couldn’t see any of them for the haunting Lacey left him with. A haunting that churned the desire inside him. A smart man would push her away. But he was never smart about Lacey.
The rapid rise and fall of her breasts made him all too conscious of the fire she stirred unknowingly. A fire that was in the midst of threatening every bit of self-control he ever demanded of himself.
She no longer stirred against him, and his groan of relief was soft. He was a fool and cursed himself for one, to remain here and not take what he wanted. No, not what he alone wanted, what Lacey refused to admit she wanted. Slipping his arms free of her, he moved to the edge of the bed. He knew that even if he left the room, there would be no peace for him this night … not with the fire raging inside him, not with Lacey ready to fight him.
Lacey should have been relieved when he moved away, but she wasn’t. She couldn’t stop the tears that slid silently down her cheeks while questions began to surface as the cloud of liquor-induced stupor lifted. Was this what their marriage would be like? Nights of longing, days of bitter fighting? Neither of them would find any peace until one or the other was driven over the edge. Rafe’s impassioned voice haunted her. He wanted her, not the money. He had always wanted her.
For all that had happened, Lacey knew in both mind and heart that she loved him. She wasn’t about to lie to herself. Rafe had brought a beauty to life that she would know with no one else.
Like the wild, restless meanderings of a prey escaping the hunter, her thoughts took her on a journey of the day. April’s caustic voice gloating, Curt, pretending to help her, reminding her of what they once shared. Curt, who, while professing to love her, made her doubt he knew the meaning of the word. Rafe knew what love was. Rafe had not lied with his kisses or the feelings they shared. Love was what he had offered. Love was what Rafe made her feel and give to him in return.
She felt his restless moves and wondered if he, too, was thinking of the day past. How different it all could have been. Every nerve ending in her body was alive to him. This should have been the beginning of something special for both of us, she painfully acknowledged. Here we lay, inches apart, while miles of deceit separate us in thoughts.
But she didn’t want to begin a life of war, and that’s all that rose before her. Trust could be rebuilt; she feared it, but she had the courage to try. Would she allow pride to erect a wall that might never be torn down? What if there was a child? Could she bear raising a son or daughter with the coldness that she had been forced to live with?
Lacey turned to her side. There were more questions, but she was tired of not having the answers.
Her hand rested lightly on Rafe’s chest, and she felt him tense.
“Don’t,” he warned. “Don’t push your luck,” he added in a hoarse whisper.
“My luck hasn’t been very good so far, has it, Rafe? And you never let my being angry stop you. We made promises to each other today. I don’t want them to be lies, too.” She closed her eyes and felt his fingertip brush the tears from her lashes. “Do you want me to beg?”
“No, por Dios, no. I just want you to be sure of what you’re saying, Lacey.” He shook like a green boy awaiting her answer.
“Loving someone isn’t easy, is it, Rafe?”
“Hell, I don’t know. I never loved any woman before you.”
“Your mother—”
“What a man feels for his mother … it’s different. I don’t know how to explain. She tried to shield me and was good to me, and maybe a man looks for that in the woman he loves. But there’s more,” he whispered harshly, framing her face with his hands, “so much more that I want and need from you.”
The ache in his hard, tense body was reflected in her own, and Lacey knew she feared talking now. “Rafe?” she murmured, opening her eyes to see him watching her. “I want and need you, too.”
It seemed that time froze for a few moments as they stared into each other’s eyes, doubts and questions clouding them, giving way to the passion flare each so easily called from the other. With a groan that was torn from deep inside him, Rafe slowly lowered his head, his lips hovering over hers.
“Be sure, mi esposa.”
“Esposa?”
“Wife,” he grated against her already softening mouth. He breathed into the honey warmth that beckoned. “My wife.”
The day had begun with lovemaking designed to conquer, but with the first touch of his lips, Lacey prayed that the night would end with the same earth-shattering tenderness of this shared kiss.
She had feared that words would destroy this chance, yet knew that Rafe spoke to her with every delicate touch of his fingertips that she helplessly returned, shaking with passion.
Her senses were alive to his determination that bitterness be cast aside to allow the wonder of a softer, but no less soul-embodied loving to begin. They moved together with the liquid grace of lovers who knew each other well, but with the added newness that here began a commitment for the rest of their lives.
His hand stilled her impatience and fired her need until Lacey desired only to return its full measure. He made short work of ridding her of the camisole and cotton drawers, but when he tossed them aside and turned back, Lacey strung kisses down the side of his corded neck and across the misted swell of his shoulder. When he tried to stop her hands teasing the inner flesh of his thigh, Lacey moved her body against him so that he was forced to pay heed to the fervency of her need to love him.
Rafe slid his hands through her long hair to cup her head when she persisted in trailing kisses over his chest. His breath caught when he realized her intent.
“Come to me, love,” he whispered. “Let me love you.”
His words fueled the yearning she had to claim him just as he had possessed her beyond herself. She felt his bo
dy jerk with a convulsive move as her lips, provocative and warm with moisture, touched his heated flesh. Rafe’s soft, almost tormented groan satisfied the womanly instinct that drove her. Lacey let the swirling move of her tongue drive him to the edge of desire, hold him there, and then, slowly entice him back.
She was caught unaware when, with a quick, brutal twist, Rafe had her beneath him, poised and waiting. With a gentle move she offered herself, and just as gently he claimed her.
But their passion was that born of storms, and they were lost in a fever of emotions that intoxicated their senses, until neither knew where the other began.
The sound of men’s excited voices along with the loud banging of doors in the hall made an unwanted intrusion into their world.
Lacey tensed and Rafe quickly soothed her. “It’s nothing. They’re drunk. Drunk like me, from loving you.” His lips stole her cry, just as his need drove him to share again the ecstasy that was theirs alone.
Lacey had no thought for what was past and what was to come. There was only now and Rafe. Rafe who brought her warmth and life. His mouth bit into hers. She made a tiny sound, straining to be closer to him. She could never deny him, not even in her deepest dreams. And never when she needed him so much.
Rafe felt emotions spear through him like lightning in a storm. It changed him in an instant when he thought of the emptiness he faced without Lacey. He felt the bite of her nails raking his back and held her beneath him until the hard, sensual tugging of his mouth made her cry out. He could feel the pleasure that ran through her body in the same rhythms that drove his. And when she was wild from loving torment, crying his name with broken breaths, only then did he come to her, moving inside her, inciting her with a dark savagery of words and even darker caresses. When she tightened around him, he took her mouth to still her scream and give her his own as they rushed to join in passion’s endless song.
With a sudden cry of outrage that stunned Lacey, Rafe tore himself away. It took seconds for her to understand that someone was shouting and pounding on their door.
Western Winds Page 25