Creed's Honor

by Linda Lael Miller

  Tricia smiled, imagining the scene. She’d probably never pass through the gate out front again without thinking of her spirited great-grandparents and the romantic scandal they must have created, back in the day.

  Some things, she thought happily, never change.

  Downstairs, the doorbell rang.

  Tricia carried the phone into her bedroom, which was at the front of the house, and wiped a circle in the thawing frost covering the window. A large brown truck was parked at the curb, undaunted by the high snowbanks.

  “I’m pretty sure Winston is here,” Tricia announced.

  “Well, then, you go and welcome him, dear. Doris says they have computers on the ship, so I’ll be in touch after we set sail.”

  “Natty?” Tricia said, moving through the house, toward the inside staircase. “Yes, dear?”

  “I love you.”

  Natty gave a pleased little chuckle. “Well, I love you, too, dear. Take good care of Winston.”

  “I will,” Tricia promised, disconnecting and laying the handset on the wide windowsill in the entryway so she could open the door.

  “Meow,” Winston complained peevishly, from inside his plastic carrier.

  The driver, presumably the aforementioned Buddy, wore earmuffs as well as a stocking cap, a heavy scarf and a quilted uniform to match his truck.

  “Tricia McCall?” he asked.

  “That’s me,” Tricia said.

  “Reooooow,” Winston insisted.

  Buddy handed Tricia the electronic equivalent of a clipboard, so she could sign for the cat.

  “He’s been doing that since we left Denver this morning,” Buddy said. “Miss Natty gave me all his gear, but that’s still in the truck. Maybe you ought to take him inside, though, while I fetch it. I wouldn’t want the noisy little feller to catch a cold or anything.”

  “Good idea,” Tricia said. She stepped into the house, set the carrier down on the floor and opened the little gate.

  Winston shot through the opening like a furry bullet and made a dash for the stairway.

  Valentino gave a brief, happy bark of welcome, already partway down the stairs.

  Just as Buddy was handing over the pet-store bags filled with cat toys, a fluffy little bed, a new litter box, a five-pound bag of cat food and three cans of sardines, Carolyn drove up.

  She passed the retreating Buddy on the as-yet-un-shoveled walk, high-stepping it toward the porch.

  “I see you survived the storm,” Carolyn called, her voice sunny.

  Tricia thought of the chain of tumultuous orgasms she’d enjoyed, first on the floor in front of the downstairs fireplace and then upstairs, in her bed. Survived was hardly the word, but for now, she’d keep that to herself.

  “Come in,” Tricia said, smiling at her friend. “Before you freeze.”

  Winston zoomed past, evidently running off some of his excess energy.

  Carolyn laughed and raised one eyebrow in good-natured question.

  “That’s Winston,” Tricia explained. “When he calms down, I’ll introduce the two of you. In the meantime, the coffee’s on upstairs, and you look like you could use a cup.”

  Carolyn nodded, and the two of them climbed the stairs.

  In Tricia’s kitchen, they settled themselves at the table, their steaming cups in front of them. Tricia was bursting with her news, but she wanted to tell Diana first, now that Natty knew.

  Carolyn took on a serious expression. “I think you should know about Brody Creed and me,” she said.

  Surprised, Tricia studied her. “That’s not necessary,” she said carefully.

  “It is for me,” Carolyn said. “I know you and Conner have something going, and he’s Brody’s brother, of course, and—well—it will just be too awkward, keeping secrets.”

  “Okay,” Tricia said, drawing out the word, wondering if, as curious as she was, she really wanted to hear this story.

  Carolyn took in a long breath and let it out very slowly, in a here-goes kind of way. Her high cheekbones were pink, partly because she’d been out in the cold, certainly, but mostly because she was embarrassed.

  “A couple of years ago,” she began, “I was housesitting for Davis and Kim, while they were on the road. One night, Brody showed up—I thought he was Conner, of course, but I realized my mistake as soon as I got a good look at him, standing there under the porch light. I told him the Creeds weren’t home, and he said that was just his luck, or something like that. He looked so tired and discouraged and—well, sort of scruffy—that’s mainly how I knew he wasn’t Conner—he said he’d spend the night in the barn and head out in the morning.” Carolyn stopped, sipped her coffee, swallowed in a way that looked painful. “He didn’t leave in the morning,” she said finally. “And after that first night, he didn’t sleep in the barn, either.”

  Tricia waited, knowing there was more.

  “I thought—” Carolyn paused again and gave a bitter little laugh, shaking her head, “I thought I meant something to him. We talked about so many things—he told me about growing up as an identical twin, and all about his falling-out with Conner—but there was one thing he left out.”

  Again Tricia waited. The moment was too delicate not to.

  “He was about to marry another woman—and she was carrying his baby.”

  Tricia ached for Carolyn, and for Brody and the unknown woman and the baby. It was a lose-lose situation, all the way around.

  “That’s pretty much it,” Carolyn said, her eyes filling.

  Tricia reached across the table and squeezed her hand. “Let’s have one more cup of coffee,” she said, “before we go downstairs and start taking your things out of boxes and putting them away.”

  “I—” Carolyn cleared her throat, blushed harder. “I wouldn’t want anyone else to know—”

  “Don’t worry,” Tricia replied. “As my dad used to say, mum’s the word.”

  Carolyn laughed, wiping away tears at the same time. “Mine used to say that, too,” she said. Tricia smiled.

  Winston jumped unceremoniously into Carolyn’s lap and settled himself there, purring loudly. Valentino, standing nearby, looked a little envious.

  Carolyn stroked the cat’s back, smiling down at him.

  “I guess I’ve made another friend,” she said.

  EPILOGUE

  New Year’s Eve

  The Brown Palace, Denver

  CONNER SWEPT HIS WIFE of two full hours up into his arms and kissed her soundly, outside the door of Room 719.

  They’d been married at her great-aunt Doris’s place, with Natty giving the bride away and Brody serving as best man, while Davis and Kim and a very quiet Carolyn looked on. Tricia’s mother and stepfather had been there, too, via webcam, as had Diana and Paul and a very excited Sasha, the three of them tuning in from their apartment in Paris.

  Yep, it was a high-tech world, all right. Fit to boggle a cowboy’s mind.

  And speaking of scrambling a man’s brain…

  “I love you so much,” Tricia said, after Conner had managed to jimmy open their hotel room door and carry her over the unusually high threshold.

  Champagne awaited, nestled in a silver ice bucket, and the bed had been strewn with delicate white rose petals, a touch Kim had suggested. Now, seeing the effect, Conner was glad he’d called the florist and had those flowers sprinkled around.

  He kissed Tricia, letting his mouth linger on hers. The first of many lingering kisses, he thought, with a rush of grateful anticipation. “And I love you,” he answered.

  Then he set his lovely bride on her feet.

  She wobbled a little, not used to high-heeled shoes. At home on the ranch—she’d moved in with him at Thanksgiving, bringing Valentino with her—Tricia wore boots and jeans most of the time. Although she and Carolyn were cooking up a plan to open some kind of shop on the first floor of Natty’s house, the newest Mrs. Creed seemed to love living in the country.

  Seeing her in the fancy pale blue dress she’d bought for the weddin
g was quite a change from every day. To Conner, she always looked amazing, no matter what she was—or wasn’t—wearing.

  Flakes of snow glistened in Tricia’s hair and on the shoulders of her coat as she stood there looking at him, her heart in her eyes. He doubted a lot of things in his life, but there was no doubting her love for him.

  “It’s almost the new year,” she said. At times, the old shyness overtook her, even with him, but it never lasted long.

  He touched her cheek gently, wanting to put her at ease and, at the same time, wanting to get her naked on that flowery bed and drive her out of her mind with a whole constellation of explosive orgasms.

  “New year, new life,” he said, helping her out of the coat, watching as she kicked off the shoes. Wriggled her toes and sighed with undisguised relief.

  A few moments after that, she moved close, slipped her arms around Conner’s neck, and nibbled at his mouth, her eyes dancing with sultry mischief now.

  “Make love to me, Mr. Creed,” she murmured.

  He gave a throaty laugh, a little raspy, a little raw. It was terrifying to be so happy, to fly so close to the sun. “It would be my pleasure, Mrs. Creed,” he replied.

  Tenderly, Conner turned Tricia around, unzipped her wedding dress, and eased it off her perfect shoulders, down over her arms and her hips, letting it fall into a patch of glistening blue on the floor.

  She faced him, a vision in her white lacy bra and panties, no longer shy.

  She was flushed, from the curve of her breasts to her hairline, but her eyes blazed with passion and confidence and the power to turn him inside out and then put him right again.

  “Your turn,” she said.

  Conner grinned. He took off his coat, tossed it aside.

  Tricia moved in to loosen his tie, open the first few buttons of his shirt. She made a soft cooing sound as she touched her lips to the skin at the base of his throat, and he could feel his heart beating there.

  And somewhere else, too.

  “It’s our first time as husband and wife,” she murmured, baring more and more of his chest, putting her hands under his shirt, fingers splayed and searching. “Let’s make it wild.”

  Conner gave an exultant laugh. “Good idea,” he said, just before he kissed her. All the while, he was peeling off the last stitches of fabric keeping him from her. He lifted her off the floor, and her legs, with their sexy pull-up stockings, the only things she was still wearing, went around him.

  They kept kissing.

  Tricia moaned.

  Conner used his tongue, foreshadowing what would happen in the very near future.

  He laid her sideways on the bed, and the rose petals settled around her, softly fragrant.

  Conner straightened, one knee on the mattress, took his time rolling down one of Tricia’s stockings, then the other. She gasped and moved her head slowly from side to side as he stroked the insides of her thighs, the soft mound of her belly, her firm breasts.

  Her nipples hardened against his palms, and she cried out for him, grabbed for him, trying to pull him down on top of her.

  “You wanted it wild,” he reminded her.

  She nodded, her eyes closed, making that low, come-hither sound she always made when she needed him inside her. “And fast—” she told him breathlessly.

  But Conner draped her legs over his shoulders, one at a time.

  Tricia bit down on her lower lip, but she couldn’t contain the soft, choking cry his touch elicited.

  He bent his head to the crux of her, nuzzled his way through warm silk, and took her greedily into his mouth.

  She climaxed almost instantly, in a wild, writhing fury of surrender, but when it was over, when she settled, sighing with satisfaction, into the cushion of rose petals, clearly, she expected Conner to take her then.

  Instead, he started her on a second climb, this one long and slow, to heaven.

  ISBN: 978-1-4592-0529-1

  CREED’S HONOR

  Copyright © 2011 by Linda Lael Miller

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