by Gigi Moore
Lily’s presence was only serving to make Wyatt angrier and not helping matters at all.
“Lily, go back into the house.”
She looked at Dakota for a long moment then backed away, nodding as she turned and ran back to the house.
“Wyatt, please think about what you are doing. Think about your wife and son.”
Wyatt stopped tussling and hissed in a breath. “You son of a bitch.”
“I will be that if it will stop you from going on this fool’s errand.”
“Get off me.”
“You will not try to leave without listening to me?”
“I’ll listen. Now get off!”
Dakota eyed him warily for a moment before finally moving off of Wyatt.
Rather than get up, Wyatt dusted off his pants and sat back against the barn door.
Dakota followed suit and sat next to him in the dirt. He stared off into the distance, listening to the sounds of the fast-approaching evening—the crickets in the grass, the owls in the trees—and watching as the setting sun enclosed the nearby land in a canopy of radiant gloom.
“I can’t just let him get away with it.”
Dakota turned to watch Wyatt’s profile, saw the muscles flex in his jaw as he gritted his teeth in the quickly growing shadows.
“What do you hope to accomplish by going after him?”
“He hurt our Lilybelle.”
“And nothing you do now will change that.”
“So I just shouldn’t do anything?”
It was a simple question and Dakota did not have an answer for Wyatt, simple or otherwise. He wished that he did. Instead he quoted Confucius, one of his favorite philosophers. “Before you embark on a journey of revenge, dig two graves.”
“What in tarnation is that supposed to mean?”
“You are a smart man, Wyatt, and I believe you know exactly what it means.” Dakota stared at his outline, waiting for Wyatt to face him. Once he had the other man’s full attention, he said, “It means you need to think about your son. Do you want him to grow up without a father?”
“I don’t intend on getting killed.”
“What you intend on doing and what may actually occur are two different things.”
Wyatt held his gaze. “Where are your parents, Dakota?”
“I am sure you have already figured that out.”
“Because I’m a smart man, yep. But humor me anyway.”
Dakota swallowed over the sudden lump in his throat, leaned back against the barn door, and stared straight ahead into the darkness.
“My father was a white man and my mother was Kiowa. There were some men in the town where we lived who did not appreciate an Indian woman being married to a white man. One day, these men decided to make their opinions known. My mother was raped and murdered in our home…” Dakota heard Wyatt’s hitch of breath beside him, but hurried on before Wyatt could express any sympathy and he lost his nerve. “My father knew who was responsible. Everyone in town knew, but the guilty parties were white men, more valuable than an Indian woman. When my father brought his suspicions to the sheriff, he was brushed aside like…like he was worthless, as worthless as those men and the sheriff had considered my mother.
“My father decided that if he could not obtain justice the legal way, he would go out and seek it on his own…” Dakota closed his eyes as the sounds of the night closed in around him, reminding him of the night he had received the news that his father would not be returning home outside of a pine box.
The touch on his shoulder was expected, simultaneously appreciated and unwelcomed.
“Dakota, I’m sorry.”
Dakota turned to Wyatt again. “I do not want you to be sorry for me. I want you to think about what you are doing before you take Little Wyatt’s father away from him the way my father was taken from me.”
* * * *
Lily knew she shouldn’t have said anything no matter how much Wyatt had pleaded and demanded. She had come this far without saying anything. She should have stuck to her guns. She had, in fact, vowed to take the name to her grave, but now it was out there and she couldn’t take it back. She wasn’t going to compound the issue, however, and elaborate no matter how much Wyatt questioned her.
She closed her eyes now, briefly reliving the attack, the beating, and name-calling and the pain. She didn’t like to think of her attacker as a man, or even a human. He was a savage just as she had told Wyatt he was. Her description hadn’t been a lie. Her description had been more accurate than anyone could know because only a savage could do to a woman what her attacker had done to her. For her to voice his name made him real, gave him credibility and power over her. It gave him sway over her life, the people she loved and wanted to protect from his evil.
Lily did not want to give him that power over her. She wanted to forget he existed. She, however, knew this was impossible.
She sat on the edge of a kitchen chair wringing a handkerchief in her hands when she heard the sound of heavy footfalls on the front porch.
Lily held herself as still as she could, afraid of being disappointed when only one of her men came through the door and not both.
What would she do if Dakota had not been able to talk Wyatt out of his insane mission of revenge? She couldn’t lose him. She didn’t want to lose either of them.
By the time Wyatt appeared on the kitchen threshold, a sight for sore eyes, all lean and healthy and whole, Lily had decided she wouldn’t say any more about her attack no matter how much interrogating Wyatt did. That ugly part of her life—of their lives—was over, dead, and buried as far as she was concerned.
It was enough that Dakota had talked Wyatt out of rushing off for vengeance and had averted disaster. Lily was not going to reverse everything Dakota had done and tempt fate by telling Wyatt anything else.
When her husband squatted before her chair and smiled, Lily’s heart stuttered and sped.
Hold your ground. Do not falter…“Is everything okay?”
“Right as a trivet. Dakota talked some sense into me. I’ve seen the light.”
Lily leaned forward, tunneled her fingers through Wyatt’s blond waves, and searched his face. He seemed relaxed enough and didn’t drop his gaze from hers when she stared at him.
Wyatt lifted her skirt, sliding his hands under her bloomers and caressing the insides of her thighs with his thumbs as Dakota walked into the room. “Things are so right, in fact, I think we should go upstairs like you wanted to before…all of us.”
They hadn’t all been together since they had brought Little Wyatt back home with them. To be fair, the house had been full of company often enough that they hadn’t had time to be with each other even if Little Wyatt had been asleep. As many people had come by to give their well-wishes to Little Wyatt as had come by to welcome back Lily from her ordeal.
Lily thought the visits were just as much out of curiosity as genuine concern and affection. In the next few weeks she, Wyatt, and Dakota would come to know who their true friends were like she and Wyatt had discovered once Lily had returned and the visits and well-wishes dwindled soon after.
Wyatt had lowered his head and was kissing a trail up her thighs, following his hands until his mouth poised at the hot, wet juncture between her legs.
Lily fisted his hair as he put his mouth on her through the cotton material of her bloomers and pushed his tongue against her pussy. The rasp of her bloomers pressing so intimately against her folds had her wriggling in her seat. She writhed beneath Wyatt’s mouth, mind almost going totally blank except with the thoughts of what her husband was doing to her.
Wyatt pressed his face against her covered pussy, working her into a frenzy with just his mouth. Her skin was so sensitive that the puffs of breath from his nose pushed her right over the edge into a pit of blinding pleasure.
Lily squeezed her thighs together around Wyatt’s head and held him in place with her hands as the shudders tore through her body.
Wyatt didn’t give her a c
hance to come completely down. As she slumped back against the chair spent and satiated, he scooped her up into his arms and carried her out of the kitchen, through the great room, to the stairs. “No interruptions, this time.”
“No interruptions.” Lily dragged her eyes open and caressed his face, glancing over his shoulder to see Dakota bringing up the rear. She reached her hand out to him and Dakota took it, dropping a gentle kiss on the back of her wrist as he climbed the stairs behind them.
They passed the room where Lily had put Little Wyatt down for the night.
“He’ll be all right,” Wyatt whispered.
“Am I that obvious?”
“The look on your face says it all.”
Dakota had walked ahead of them to open the door to the master bedroom and Wyatt carried her in, making Lily feel like it was their wedding night all over again.
She didn’t know why she was full of hope, like this was a new beginning, a fresh start—for all of them—but she did.
Wyatt carefully placed her on the bed and began taking off his clothes while Dakota wordlessly matched his moves from the opposite side of the bed.
For a long moment Lily just satisfied herself with watching them as they gradually removed layer upon layer of clothes, revealing more skin bit by bit until they both stood naked before her.
She didn’t know what was better—watching them undress themselves or helping them undress themselves—but once they were done she stood up on her knees and crawled across the bed to Wyatt.
Lily put her hands on his chest, extending her fingers on his heated skin and smoothing her hands across the wide expanse from shoulder to shoulder. She rested her cheek against his chest, listening to his heartbeat as the light dusting of hair tickled her skin.
Wyatt’s heart was strong, a reflection of the man, a reminder of what she had attempted to protect all these months. She would not lose him now. Dakota had seen to that.
Lily lifted her head at the thought and turned to Dakota as he put one knee on the bed and then the other. She went to him as Wyatt climbed onto the bed behind her to join them.
Simultaneously, they began kissing her, each taking a hand in theirs and working their way from her fingers to her throat.
Lily arched her neck, flinging her head back as she closed her eyes and let them take her.
They lowered her to the bed, working in tandem to remove each item of clothing that blocked their way to her.
The cool air of the bedroom met her skin but was soon replaced with the moist, heated sensation of Wyatt’s mouth kissing a path from her ankles to her knees to her thighs until he teased her hard little nubbin with the tip of his tongue.
Her clitoris throbbed and grew as he sucked it into his mouth.
Lily fisted his hair as he put his mouth on her.
Mindful of Little Wyatt down the hall, Lily bit her lip to hold in a cry.
Her efforts were stretched to the limit when Dakota joined the action.
The warmth of his skin alone almost sent her spiraling down that familiar intimate rabbit hole of no control.
Lily whimpered when he covered both her breasts with his hands, gently fondling and pinching the inflamed nipple of one while nibbling and licking the hardened nipple of the other.
This was an attack on her body, too, but of a different kind.
The coordinated movements of Dakota above and Wyatt below assailed her senses with single-minded intent, their one purpose to show her pleasure and admiration and not cause her pain and humiliation.
Lily closed her eyes and gave herself over to their devices, feeling liberated and whole, feeling safe and secure.
She felt the bed dip beneath Wyatt’s weight as he climbed up the bed to rest beside her before he pulled her into his arms.
Dakota shifted behind her, moving into position as Wyatt did the same in front of her.
Wyatt slid two fingers inside her pussy, wiggling them around to brush her inner walls as he flicked her engorged clitoris with his thumb.
Lily bucked against him just as Dakota gripped her hip with one hand while liberally applying lubricant in and around her anus with the other.
Maia had brought the fragrant oil from her and Sabrina’s shop and left it in another swag bag for Lily earlier in the day. Lily hadn’t thought that she’d get a chance to use it so soon and appreciated that Dakota was always prepared for these moments.
He had once said it was his duty to ensure her comfort and he’d never failed to do so since she’d known him.
Dakota ensured that and so much more when he slid one finger into her anus and slowly opened her before sliding in a second one.
He rested his chin against her shoulder, nuzzling her cheek before he murmured, “We are almost there, naw tane…” He circled the outer shell of her ear with his tongue as he removed his fingers and pressed his hips closer, preparing to mount her.
Wyatt took his cue and teased her soaked folds with the head of his hard cock before he slowly thrust inside her pussy.
Dakota plunged inside her anus a second later and Lily couldn’t help the shout that escaped her lips, instantly smothered by Wyatt’s eating kiss.
The burning sensation subsided, quickly replaced with that satisfying white heat that Lily had come to associate with being filled by her two men. She tightened her inner muscles around their solid, throbbing cocks, welcoming them home.
Wyatt threw one leg over Lily’s hip, bringing both her and Dakota closer, creating an erotic cocoon where only the three of them existed, hovering on the edge of completion.
Lily squeezed her eyes tight, bright colors and lights bursting before her lids while Wyatt and Dakota moved against her as one. She matched her moves to theirs, rocking her hips to and fro as they each drove and pushed inside her.
“Oh God!” Liquid warmth coiled down and unfurled in her pussy, igniting the same tremors that had rode her body earlier all over again.
Wyatt and Dakota responded by hurrying their thrusts, pitching her back and forth between them with the force of their passion until they both finally erupted inside her with hoarse shouts.
Lily lay between her two men, exhausted and replete, feeling like time had stopped as she listened to them panting in the darkness.
After a long while—or it could have been short, Lily had lost all track of time—Wyatt moved to the edge of the bed to turn up the kerosene lamp.
He turned back to Lily, propping himself up on his elbow and resting his chin in his hand as he watched her.
“What’s wrong?” Lily asked, butterflies taking flight in her belly as she prayed he wouldn’t ask her about her attack anymore. She didn’t know how she would put him off this time, but she would find a way if she had to.
“Nothing. I just like looking at you.”
She smiled. “I like looking at you, too, handsome.”
Wyatt chuckled but instantly turned serious again as he cupped her face. “You are so beautiful, Lily. I hope you know that.”
“You and Dakota make me feel beautiful.”
Dakota caressed her rib cage, running his hand down and around to cup her pussy.
Wyatt looked at Dakota over Lily’s shoulder and she felt something binding and secret pass between them. It was the first time since she had known either man that she had felt excluded, as if they shared something with each other that they didn’t share with her.
Had Wyatt struck some kind of bargain with Dakota out at the barn?
Chapter 24
“Dakota, you have to stop him!”
He opened his eyes, thought at first that he had only imagined the scream, that he was dreaming and reliving the events from yesterday when he had heard Lily’s desperate pleas to prevent Wyatt from leaving.
Someone shook him. He was so groggy the light from the bedside lantern burned his eyes when he opened them. Why was he finding it so hard to get up? He was usually such a light sleeper, coming fully awake at the slightest sound or movement.
Dakota sudden
ly remembered the late meal Wyatt had brought up from the kitchen. He had insisted on preparing it himself, a dinner that had included some of Lily’s beef stew from earlier, warm buttered biscuits, and tea.
He should have known that something was amiss when Wyatt did not drink any of the tea with him and Lily. Except that Wyatt had in the past often professed to being a coffee drinker, teasing Dakota about his liking the herbal concoctions his wife preferred rather than imbibing the old Arbuckle’s.
Lily’s face came into view, hovering over his, pale and distraught.
This was not a dream.
“What has happened?”
“He’s gone!”
Dakota rubbed his eyes and sat up, still not completely awake. “Calm down, Lily. Wyatt is an early riser. He is probably just out in the field getting a jump on the day.” He did not believe the lie even as he said it to comfort her.
He had let his guard down. After the shooting in the woods he had promised himself that he would never let that happen again, but he had been so drained—mentally and physically—yesterday when they finally turned in for the night. After revealing to Wyatt the account of what had happened to his parents and then the time he and Wyatt had both spent pleasuring Lily…Dakota had slept like the dead.
Evidently, so, too, had Lily. Everyone had slept like the dead except Wyatt, apparently.
Had that been his plan? He must have put something in the tea to guarantee Dakota and Lily would sleep so hard that they would not notice his departure. The only thing like that in the house that Dakota could think of was Lily’s laudanum.
Lily shook her head now, tears brimming. “I’ve searched the fields and the barn. He’s nowhere to be found, Dakota. I’m telling you, he’s gone.”
And only the Great Spirit knew how much of a head start he had gotten.
Would Wyatt have gone back on his word after all they had discussed? Had he gone out to seek retribution after all?
Dakota should have known better than to believe Wyatt had come completely around. He had been too tense yesterday, too angry to accept what had happened to Lily without acting once he thought he had learned her attacker’s identity.