by Cindy Gerard
The love she exhibited toward William was both heartwarming and hurtful to watch. The thought crept up on him so abruptly he couldn’t stop it. They could have had babies together. Four years ago he had conjured images of forever and family. And children. His and hers.
“Are you coming, slowpoke?”
Her lighthearted words spurred him away from his thoughts and back to the moment—and he got in a little trouble again.
Juanita’s borrowed gaucho hat looked saucy and sexy on top of the blond hair that Anna had woven into a tidy French braid. While Juanita’s jeans and riding boots had been a little too large for Anna, fifteen-year-old Ramon’s had fit her perfectly. Too perfectly, Greg thought as he watched her trim little bottom and slim thighs bouncing along ahead of him.
Greg had taken special care selecting their mounts. He hadn’t wanted to overwhelm Anna with one of his fiery racers. Neither had he wanted to undercut her newfound sense of adventure. Jody Rose had seemed the perfect choice for her. She was a solid, soft-mouthed black. She had a sensible head and enough speed to keep things interesting.
Yet when Anna had joined him in the barns, she’d taken one look at Skip—recognized that the sorrel gelding had more fire and more speed—and said, “He’s for me.”
He had to admit, as Anna cued Skip into a jog-trot, then eased him into a rocking lope, that she knew what she was doing.
He pulled up beside her. “You ride well.”
She angled him a look, her smile radiant. “It feels wonderful.
“Are there gopher holes?” she asked a moment later. “Can I run him?”
Greg considered the flat terrain, considered the temperature. It was a fine fifty-five degrees, warm for December, but cool by Texas standards. The horses could handle a good run.
He nodded to a spot ahead of them. “See that buffalo wallow up there?”
She searched, brows drawn together under the shade of her hat brim. “Buffalo wallow?”
He smiled. “That little gully about a quarter mile ahead.”
She followed his gaze. “Yes. I see it.”
“Well, don’t eat too much of my dust on your way there, cowgirl.” With a wicked grin, he cued Jody Rose, then gave her her head.
He heard Anna’s delighted squeal behind him and knew she’d kneed Skip into a run, too. Just that fast, the race was on.
Greg had some of the finest quarter racers in the States. As fast as Jody was though, with Greg’s extra weight, the only way Jody could hold her own in a race against Skip with a lightweight like Anna aboard was with a little head start. They gave it a good run, but he wasn’t surprised when, just shy of the finish line, Anna and Skip flashed into his peripheral vision then edged ahead by a nose.
Radiant, was all Greg could think when Anna pulled up and reined Skip around. She vibrated with energy and excitement. She glowed with both happiness and the honest emotion of competition.
“He’s fast,” she cried, patting Skip’s neck in appreciation for a job well done. “And so strong. I never realized these quarter horses had such power.”
“He’s bred to run, all right. And you’ll never encounter a breed with more heart.”
His blood still running hot from the fever of the race, Skip crow-hopped sideways, kicking up dust in his wake. “And here I always thought it was the Thoroughbreds who had all the fire.” Laughing, Anna expertly gathered Skip and settled him down.
“I’d say you’re well matched.” Greg liked the way Anna handled the spirited sorrel. Liked even more the way she looked astride the gelding, lean yet lush and buzzing with excitement. Like she’d been four years ago the first time she’d danced in his arms. The first time he’d kissed her. The first time they’d made love.
“Now that you’ve given me a sound beating,” he said, needing badly to divert his thoughts, “what would you like to see?”
“Everything,” she said so quickly it made him laugh.
“We’re talking twenty thousand acres, here, Anna. I don’t think everything is an option.”
“Twenty thousand?” She looked stunned. Looked around. Laughed. “You could fit most of Obersbourg inside your ranch.”
“Well, this is Texas,” he drawled, nudging Jody up beside Skip until he and Anna were facing each other beneath the brilliant December sun. “You might have heard. We do things big in these parts.”
To make sure she understood how big, and to satisfy a need he’d been nursing for way too long, he cupped her nape in his hand and pulled her close. “And we do things right,” he whispered as he lowered his mouth to hers.
Her lips were soft and altogether welcoming as he settled his mouth over hers and ended the waiting with a long deep taste. She was as ready for this as he was. As electric in her yearnings as he was with his greed. She tasted of salt, sex and woman. She yielded for the invasion of his tongue, welcomed the stroke of it at the seam of her lips, the thrust of it as he delved deep.
Heat, heart, total capitulation. That’s what he felt when he kissed her. That’s what she gave him. That’s what he took.
Over and over again he tasted and claimed and let her know he was done pretending there was nothing simmering between them, finished waiting for a reason to make her his. Over and over again, she met his demands, made some of her own, until the needs that mere mouths could satisfy left them hungry and impatient for more.
Eyes closed, his hand still cupping her nape, he pulled away, rested his forehead against hers as they both recovered their breath. Beneath him, Jody grew restless.
“Umm,” Anna managed on a breath that sounded as ragged and raw as he felt.
“Yeah.” He lifted his head, took in her flushed cheeks, the heavy-lidded passion in her eyes. “Umm.”
She smiled then. A slow, crooked, self-conscious and slightly victorious smile that made strange things happen inside his chest. Made other things happen much lower and threatened his capability of continuing the ride.
“We’d better get moving,” he said, when he wanted nothing more than to lift her out of that saddle and roll around with her in the Texas dust until they were both blistered by the sun—or by their passion.
Eight
The night breeze was mellow. The starlight, a gentle caress. The mood, as serene as a summer rose. Anna felt anything but mellow, or gentle or serene.
What she felt, as she sat in the garden by the fountain, was an edgy, earthy anticipation. William was sleeping over with Tito. That left her and Gregory alone in the house. She knew he would come to her tonight. And she knew when he did, the waiting and the wanting would finally be over for both of them.
Beneath the golden brilliance of the Texas moon, each moment that passed felt essential. Essential as only a handful of moments in a lifetime were essential, moments in which a vital choice must be made. A choice of either tumbling headlong over the edge into something that wasn’t entirely wise or pulling away because it was too dangerous.
Far too often in her life, when it had come time to choose, Anna had opted for safety.
She didn’t want to feel safe tonight. She didn’t want to be wise. She didn’t want to think about obligations, guilt and regret. She wanted to feel free. To flow as reckless as the moonglow that danced across the bubbling waters of the fountain and lent a shimmering effervescence to the night, a heady expectancy to the moments she and Gregory were destined to share.
Her mother would be appalled if she knew that her phone call this afternoon had actually been the catalyst for what was about to happen. The harsh words and layers of guilt had been engineered to bring Anna swiftly back to Obersbourg. To a point, she had been effective. It was at the surface again—the reminder of the duties Anna knew waited for her. To that end, her mother had been successful. In all else, she had failed.
Instead of warning Anna away from what she considered impetuous and embarrassing behavior, she had, unintentionally, given Anna the courage to answer another demand. The demand of her heart. And she had made her see and face up to a
truth that had been too long denied. A truth that was difficult but necessary to accept.
Anna understood now that she had allowed herself to become a victim. All of her life, she’d deluded herself into believing otherwise. Into believing that she’d been the dutiful daughter, that she’d been fulfilling her predestined subservient role in life. On the heels of her mother’s call, however, she now accepted that there was no other word to describe the life she had endured. It had taken the better part of the afternoon to come to terms with the weight of her discovery. The realization had been numbing, soul searing. The truth of it was both humiliating and healing.
Oddly enough, it had also been empowering and head clearing. What had to have been plain to everyone who knew her was now suddenly, stunningly clear to her, too. She’d been victimized by the cold, callous disregard of her parents. She’d been victimized by their lack of love, by their lack of involvement, by their dominance of both her spirit and her pride.
And what had she done to garner not only their indifference but, often, their cruelty? She, like Sara, had done the unforgivable. They had been born the wrong gender.
She rose, walked to the fountain, let the cool water trickle over her fingers. Let the night breeze settle the sudden pounding of the pulse at her wrist. That she wasn’t born a male was her sin. It was also her sentence. Only a legitimate male heir could save Obersbourg’s sovereignty and prevent it from being gobbled up by, and subject to, allegiance to a bigger power. She and Sara had been little more than inconveniences as children, the equivalent of chattel as they’d grown older, bargaining tools to promote marriage to royalty and wealth and ultimately to produce a legitimate heir to the Obersbourg throne.
Neither William nor Edward could satisfy the requirements. In her parents’ eyes, their own grandchildren were embarrassments, mere bastards, fathered by commoners. Because of their illegitimacy, they were of little use. Of less value.
She hugged her arms around herself to stall a chill that even the relative warmth of the Texas night couldn’t override. Because of a simple and singular whim of biology, she had been cast in the role of a victim. Because of her own willingness to let it happen, she had not only perpetuated her parents’ unforgivable sins, she’d compounded them. No longer. She would be a victim no more.
She squared her shoulders in determination. From this moment on, she would take what she wanted; she would chance what she had never dared, then she would return to Obersbourg as its princess. And when she returned, she would demand her rightful progression to power.
She was no longer willing to be a pawn for her parents’ political aspirations. She would not be bartered in exchange for Obersbourg’s sovereignty. She would not be sold to ensure solvency. Instead, she would exercise her own power as a woman, use her mind and her sense for business, her talent for economics that her father had never recognized, let alone sought out.
A horse nickered softly from the barns, the restless sound an echo of her own restlessness and the fact that tonight—this night—there was only one thing of utmost importance that demanded her attention. Not her country. Not her obligations. Not even a need that grew more pressing by the moment to tell Gregory about William.
Tonight she would be selfish. The one and only pressing issue was the man, and only the man, who had suddenly appeared from the shadows, seeking her out in the thickest part of the night.
She turned at the sound of his footsteps on the stone walkway. Stalled the little catch in her breath at the sight of him standing there. Tall. Strong. As vital as the moon. As necessary as her need to draw breath.
Behind him, the house was quiet. Beyond the moment was a promise that all was forgiven, that all love between them was not lost. Between them was only a few feet of darkness that she quickly reduced to inches.
“I’ve been waiting for you,” she said boldly.
He stood as still as the night. Only his searching gaze gave away the yearning that matched her own. “And I’ve been waiting for you...for four years too long.”
She touched her hands to the breadth of his chest. “I know. I’m so sorry.”
He covered her hands with his, lifted them to his mouth, pressed them to his lips. “Don’t be sorry. Not tonight. Just be with me.”
She burrowed into his arms, loving him, thanking him. For the gift of his forgiveness. For understanding, at least in this moment, that she could neither offer nor promise more than this one night.
He held her against him as he had one summer that now seemed so long ago. He held her in a way that made her feel fragile yet powerful, intensely feminine, shockingly sensual. Then slowly, he began to move, easing her into a dreamy dance made up of intimate turns, heady sensations—the delicious brush of hip to belly, the tingling glide of thigh meeting thigh, the exquisite friction of breast crushed to chest, the feathery warmth of his breath at her brow.
They didn’t need music. They both remembered this dance. Remembered the steps. Remembered the swirling, dizzying sensation of falling into the sweetest heat, the most perfect love.
Beneath the stars, silver shadows fell. Beneath the moon, two lovers—lost so long to each other—kissed. Slow, unhurried, predestined.
“Make love to me,” she murmured even as he swept her up and into his arms.
Like the rest of the house, Gregory’s bedroom was big, bold, beautiful. Like him. Shadowed by night, the muted colors and high ceilinged walls were illuminated by a low burning fire in the adobe-and-limestone fireplace.
Anna noticed it all on a peripheral level as Gregory carried her inside and set her on her feet beside his bed. It was a big bed. A tall, massive four-poster, hand-hewn of bleached cypress and covered by a thick, downy cream and tawny comforter. No sight had ever looked as welcoming—except for the man who stood before her.
His eyes never left her face as he reached for her, his big hands and blunt-tipped fingers slowly and none too steadily undoing her blouse, one button at a time. She covered his hands with hers, gently guiding, mostly riding with the rhythm, savoring the anticipation and the need and the promise of skin on skin.
The back of a knuckle accidentally grazed her nipple. When she bit her lower lip and softly moaned, he revisited that ultra sensitive area again, this time, no accident, this time to entice, arouse and elevate her need by slow, hot degrees.
He stepped back then, mere inches, and left her wanting, left her weak.
“Take it off,” he ordered gruffly when her blouse lay open to reveal the delicate white lace of her bra, the firekissed expanse of bare skin.
Never more aware of her need for him, she tugged the blouse from her jeans, shrugged it off, one shoulder at a time, fascinated as he pulled off his boots, then went to work on his own shirt. Unbuttoning then tugging loose his shirttail was as far as he got before he reached for her again, drew her hard against him and into a deep, searing kiss.
The heat was wonderful, the breadth of his big callused hands on her bare back a heady abrasion, a welcome possession. And his mouth... his mouth claimed, commanded, devoured first her lips, then the column of her throat in hungry, biting kisses. She arched to his ravenous onslaught, cried out when he lifted her from her feet, then deposited her on her knees on the edge of the bed.
With his hands spanning her ribs, he drew her to him as he bent his head to her lace covered breast and suckled her through her bra, scraped his teeth in tender abrasion over her sensitized nipple. It was too much—yet not enough—as both of them reached for the clasp of her bra at the same time and fumbled frantically to undo it.
When he swore in frustration, she cradled his head in her hands, laughed softly, surprising him, calming him, steadying him long enough to free her. And then it was nothing but heat on heat. Warm, wet, consuming heat—and she wasn’t laughing any longer.
She was dying. The sweetest, most erotic, most sensual death. She buried her hands in his hair as he licked. Arched, breathless for more as he suckled. Cried his name when he bit, then soothed with a lush
swirl of his tongue, a nuzzling caress that increased the ache, intensified the burn.
She was still whimpering his name when he laid her back on his bed. Covering her with his big body, he clasped her hands in his, lifted them above her head and pressed her into the mattress with his weight.
The length of him, the heat of him, the need in him—how she’d missed it. How she’d missed this. This vital, brutal strength that hovered dangerously near the surface of his desire for her and that he kept in check by sheer will.
She caught her breath on a throaty hitch when he kneed her thighs apart. Wrapping her legs around him, she rode with the thrusting rhythm he set, begged him, “Please, please come inside me.”
He scattered kisses to her brow, enticed her higher with the gentle, riding motion of his hips. “Soon.” He whispered the promise against her parted lips as he reached between them, flipped the snap on her jeans and eased the zipper down. “I want to savor this. I want to remember this.”
She sucked in her breath, abdominal muscles contracting to make room for his heated invasion as he slipped his fingers inside, restlessly made do with a teasing touch when what she wanted was all of him, thrusting deep.
He uttered a low, pleasured sound when his fingers encountered her downy softness. Blue eyes bore into hers as he cupped her intimately, then he covered her mouth with his and swallowed her shimmery sigh when he delved deep into liquid heat. She was so ready for him. Wet and swollen. Slick and sweet.
She clenched and moved against the steady pressure of his fingers, and suddenly, his promise of soon wasn’t fast enough for either of them. Still half leaning over her, he jerkily shrugged his shirt from his shoulders, then rolled to his back and rid himself of the rest of his clothes and rolled on protection. She was already reaching for him as he tugged her jeans and panties down her hips and clear of her legs. Her small hands sought, her delicate fingers surrounded, making him burn, making her bold as she pulled him back on top of her, where they both knew he belonged.