by Carol Finch
Chapter Ten
“I hope I didn’t ruin your fancy dress,” Millie jeered sarcastically.
To Hanna’s credit, she recovered her composure. “This old thing? Don’t give it another thought, Mildred,” she said, purposely drawling out Millie’s given name. She scored a direct hit with that. Millie glowered at her. “I was planning to tear this dress into rags soon, anyway. That is, unless you would like to have it as a hand-me-down.”
Millie’s face flamed with fury. “You prissy little b—”
Cale reacted instantly, aware of the mutinous glint in Millie’s eyes. He applied pressure to her arm before she dumped the entire pot of coffee on Hanna’s head.
“Hey, Millie, get over here. My cup’s empty,” one of the men called out.
“I’m not through with you, little princess,” Millie said through gritted teeth as she jerked her arm from Cale’s grasp.
“A pity, because I’m finished with you,” Hanna said dismissively. “You may go now.”
Cale bit back a grin while Millie silently fumed and stomped away. He had to admit that Hanna could portray the regal princess when the mood suited her.
“Impressive,” he murmured.
“Thank you.” Hanna blotted at the coffee stains.
“I take it that while men rely on six-shooters to settle differences, women rely on razor-sharp tongues.”
Hanna nodded, ashamed that she’d stooped to Millie’s level. However, she wasn’t about to let that vicious-minded chit get the better of her while Cale was a witness. She did have her pride, after all.
Thankfully, the incident was forgotten when Opal Linden showed up, balancing two heaping plates of food in her hands. Hanna hadn’t realized she was famished until she tasted the succulent meal.
When Hanna finished eating, Cale insisted on walking her back to the room before relieving Pierce. Hanna was reluctant to see him go, knowing Millie was lurking about, anxious to use her wiles on Cale and humiliate Hanna in the process.
Hanna was determined to ensure her new husband returned to their room when he completed his shift at the stockade. Although she knew nothing about seduction, she wanted it known that whatever Cale needed physically, she intended to provide, despite the previous terms of their bargain. The indisputable truth was that wanting Cale had become an intense need that Hanna was ready to explore.
“Make sure you keep the door l—”
Hanna didn’t allow Cale to finish his warning. She reached up to pull his head to hers, then kissed him squarely on the mouth. Then, just in case the implication was lost on him, she said, “I’ll be waiting for you tonight. There’s something I want you to teach me. As my husband that instruction falls to you.”
He stood there gaping at her as if she had tree limbs sprouting from her ears. He opened and shut his mouth a couple of times, but no words came out. This man who’d lectured her about expecting the unexpected had been struck speechless. Hanna rather liked knowing she’d stunned him to the bone.
Finally he found his tongue and frowned. “Look, Magnolia, if you’re worried that it has to be you, just so it won’t be her tonight, you can forget it,” he said, his voice sounding strangled and not at all like that deep resonant baritone she’d come to associate with him. “We have a deal.”
“The terms have changed since we last spoke of it.”
Hanna noted that she had his complete and undivided attention. She wanted this man who was her husband to know that she was curious and willing to explore the passion he instilled in her. Millie’s intrusion and threats had stiffened Hanna’s resolve, and she wasn’t going to back down, even if she was a mite apprehensive about what awaited her.
He stared at her in that unique, probing way of his for so long that she fidgeted from one foot to the other. “You’re sure about this, Mags?” he asked eventually.
Hanna nodded, then unlocked the door. “I’ll be waiting for you,” she said. Then she closed the door in his face.
Cale braced both arms on the wall, sucked in a great gulp of air and tried to recover from shock. Hanna wanted him to teach her the intricacies of passion? And he was hesitant, why?
He glanced down to note that Skeet had returned and had come to heel. Cale hesitantly reached out to open the door for the dog. Hanna was standing in the middle of the room, looking like the devil’s own temptation, despite the fading bruise on her cheek and the stain on her gown.
“I’ll be back in three hours. Lock the door,” he said before he turned and walked away.
He shouldn’t even consider the prospect of bedding his new wife, he told himself on the way downstairs. He saw Millie sometimes when he was killing time between forays. But Hanna was…well, she wasn’t about killing time and simply appeasing basic needs. Worse, he could bring an unwanted child into the world. Being one himself, he’d been very careful not to let that happen. Besides, Hanna was chasing long-held dreams of independence and unlimited freedom. She didn’t want a child to slow her down. And certainly not a half-breed’s child.
Cale dragged in a steadying breath and ambled toward the stockade. He had three hours to decide whether to accept his wife’s unexpected invitation.
Halfway there Cale realized the decision had been made. He wanted Hanna—badly. Maybe even more than he wanted to see justice served on Otis Pryor. The intensity of that need shocked him, unsettled him.
Hopelessly distracted, Cale mumbled a response to Pierce’s attempt at conversation during the changing of the guard. Cale sank down on the ground and spent the next three hours trying to figure out how a gentleman was supposed to handle the deflowering of his innocent bride to ensure she enjoyed the encounter. Now how was that possible when her husband was so eager to have her that he wasn’t sure he possessed the tenderness and patience required?
Those next three hours were the longest, most uncertain and troubling of his life.
Dressed in a nightgown, Hanna lay in bed. She was a mass of jittery nerves. She reminded herself—about a hundred times—that she’d asked for this monumental night with Cale. True, she did want to consummate their marriage so her father couldn’t have it annulled, but that wasn’t the deciding factor. She also realized that her decision had nothing to do with wanting Cale in her bed just because she couldn’t tolerate the prospect of Cale ending up in Millie’s bed. No, Millie might have triggered the decision, but this was about what Hanna felt for Cale, what she wanted to share with him.
Resolved though she was, she knew she’d be a nervous wreck by the time Cale arrived. She’d been out of her element for over a week and now she really was treading deep water. She hadn’t a clue how to pleasure a man, especially since she’d spent the past few years devising ways to avoid unwanted male attention.
The quiet rap echoed in the silence and Hanna tensed. Since Skeet hadn’t growled a warning she was pretty sure it was a friendly caller, but Cale had instructed her never to open the door without demanding to know who was on the other side. And even then, to be prepared for the unexpected.
“Who’s there?” she called out.
“Pierce Hayden,” a male voice replied quietly.
Hanna bolted upright. “Is Julius all right? Is Cale? Is there some sort of trouble with the prisoners?”
“No, ma’am. Julius is resting. Just thought I’d let you know I’m on my way down to relieve your husband.”
“Thank you,” Hanna murmured.
Knowing Cale would arrive in a few minutes gave Hanna a worse case of the jitters than she already had. She reminded herself the intimate ordeal wouldn’t take long—not according to her married friends. Then she’d be a wife and woman in the true sense of the words. All she had to do was endure the intimate invasion and pretend to enjoy the tryst—somewhat, at least.
The faint creak of the window sliding upward brought Hanna’s head around. With her breath trapped in her throat, she watched the muscular hulk in buckskins glide agilely through the opening. Obviously Cale had remembered he didn’t have a key and had
chosen an alternate route.
He said not one word as he rose to full stature. Silhouetted by moonlight, he peeled off his shirt. Hanna sighed at the sheer masculine beauty poised before her. She’d seen this impressive muscular chest once before and she itched to get her hands on it. Whether or not she had an aptitude for art, she did know she had a fine appreciation for masterpieces. Cale Elliot was definitely a masterpiece of rugged and powerful beauty. She studied him admiringly and felt her apprehension drifting away in the cool breeze that flowed through the window.
Mesmerized, she watched Cale move silently toward her like a mystical warrior. She waited expectantly for him to shed his breeches and quickly conclude his husbandly duties. But he didn’t move, just hovered beside the bed, looking down at her from the shadows. She wanted to rant at him to get on with it because the suspense was about to kill her.
Finally he spoke. “I’ll ask you again. Are you sure about this, Magnolia? Now’s the time to tell me if you’ve changed your mind.”
His voice sounded rough, almost gruff—which didn’t do a thing for the apprehension that returned full force. “I’m sure,” she bleated.
When he reached down to doff his breeches, Hanna stared, wide-eyed, then gulped when she saw her first frontal view of a fully aroused man in the buff. Her startled gaze shot up to his shadowed face. His white teeth flashed and she heard the soft rumble of laughter.
“Absolute last chance,” he said as he sank down on the edge of the bed.
He leaned over to kiss her tenderly, gently, as if he had all the time in the world. Even though Hanna knew it would be an impossible fit, which suggested serious discomfort on her part, she told herself this incredibly sweet kiss was worth the forthcoming pain. His sensuous lips skimmed unhurriedly over hers. Then he kissed her cheeks, her eyelids and her forehead in a way that touched her heart. The tension evaporated and she didn’t object when he slowly drew her nightgown over her head and tossed it on the foot of the bed.
Hanna trembled when his hand slid around her waist, then glided up her rib cage to cup her breast. His thumb brushed her nipple and fire coiled in the pit of her belly. Her breath sighed out of her and she went boneless as he gently urged her to her back. Like her own shadow, he followed her down, his lips hovering over the aching peaks of her breasts.
“Oh…my,” Hanna wheezed, marveling at the unexpected sensations shimmering through her.
She felt his smile against her skin and wondered what he found amusing. There was nothing funny about the tingling feelings he evoked in her as his hands and lips grazed her flesh, igniting scalding fires that burst through her bloodstream.
For a man who’d proved himself to be swiftly expedient—and was known for getting right to the point in conversation—Cale was certainly taking his sweet time in doing the deed. Oh certainly, she’d sensed and seen that there was more to this legendary bounty hunter than what the world perceived. And to be sure, he was hard-nosed and tough. But there was a gentler side to Cale Elliot that stirred her heart and touched her soul.
She suspected that he’d sensed her anxiety and uncertainty, and the dear, sweet man was trying to make this encounter as painless for her as possible. He’d accomplished that about three kisses and caresses ago, for she felt like molded clay in his skillful hands. He, she decided, was the artist in the family. He was sketching tenderness all over her—from breasts to hips and everywhere in between.
When his hand drifted down her belly, headed for more intimate places, her breath stalled in her chest. She tensed, uncertain and yet curious about what he planned to do next.
“Breathe, Hanna,” he murmured as his lips skimmed over her bare hip. “I won’t hurt you. I’d never hurt you.”
She tried to breathe, really she did. But her ultrasensitive skin trembled like an earthquake as his hands, tongue and lips ventured lower, setting off all sorts of indescribable sensations. Desire, like a lightning bolt, shot into the very core of her being and left her body rumbling like thunder. Her breath came out in shallow spurts and muffled moans when his fingertips grazed her inner thigh and his thumb glided over the slick heat between her legs.
“Cale? What…ah…” Her voice gave out when he dragged his mouth over her and his tongue flicked out to tease her. Nothing had prepared her for the throbbing heat of erotic pleasure that shattered her inhibitions in less than a heartbeat. Shamelessly, she arched toward his mouth, then felt the gentle glide of his fingertips against her softest flesh. With each stroke of his fingers, need coiled tighter and tighter. When he intimately caressed her with the tip of his tongue, wild spasms of pleasure riveted her.
She clutched at his shoulders in frantic desperation and gasped for breath. What was he doing to her? She was coming unwound from inside out, and intense pleasure was expanding and spreading through her so rapidly that she feared she’d burst with it!
“No!” Hanna gasped when his hands and lips glided over her and a dozen more red-hot tremors of need bombarded her. “Do something!”
“I thought I was,” he said, chuckling as she writhed beneath his hands and lips, begging for an end to the sweet torture. But Cale had waited three long hours for this one chance to touch Hanna intimately, to taste the liquid fire of desire he’d called from her. As much as he wanted her—and that went without saying—feeling her shimmering like hot rain on his lips and fingertips was beyond incredible. He’d never taken so much time with a woman, never dared such intimacy, never felt such an inexplicable need to give so much of himself to what had previously been brief, empty encounters to appease basic lust.
Lust he understood and accepted for what it was. This was different, because Hanna was different. She was his virgin wife. A woman who’d placed trust in him to protect her. A woman who knew nothing about passion and desire—except what he taught her.
“I want you,” she panted, still clawing impatiently at him.
The woman was a wildcat and she was leaving her mark on his forearms. “You’ll have me,” he insisted, grinning as he’d never grinned before. “Patience, Mags, in due time—”
His voice shattered when her hand folded around his rigid flesh and she drew him toward her. He’d intended to get to that phase of lovemaking during the second lesson. Third, maybe. He hadn’t wanted to rush through this unprecedented moment with Hanna, but when she took him in hand—literally—the need to possess her completely overwhelmed his barely restrained body.
“Please…please,” she chanted breathlessly.
Cale fought the good fight for self-control and discovered the meaning of defeat. He surged over her, braced himself on his knees and drove into her like a wild man. When she groaned, he cursed himself soundly and repeatedly.
“You just couldn’t wait, could you, Mags?” he said hoarsely. “I didn’t want to hurt you and now I have.”
“Hurt me?” She gyrated her hips, pushing him deeper into her velvety warmth. “I ached worse when you weren’t inside me. Now I feel better.”
The woman never failed to surprise and delight him, and he was a man who’d never liked to be surprised or ill prepared. But he was totally unprepared when Hanna arched toward him, then grabbed him by the hair on his head and brought his lips down hard upon hers. She kissed him as if she wanted him—as desperately as he wanted and needed her.
Cale’s self-control deserted him completely. He held nothing back, giving all of himself to her pleasure—and his. He plunged and withdrew, caught up in the ageless rhythm that mindless passion demanded—and so did his uninhibited wife. Cale felt the coil of desire unraveling, felt the fervent sensations blazing through him like a river of molten fire.
Indescribable sensations swamped him as he drove into her, and she matched him thrust for desperate thrust. He felt her contracting around him, heard her muffled shriek against his chest and then he tumbled pell-mell into the kaleidoscopic abyss.
Shudder after helpless shudder wracked his body. He cursed himself mightily for not withdrawing from her immediately. As
if he could have untangled himself from Hanna, he mused, dazed. She clung to him, her legs locked around his hips, her nails spiking the corded muscles of his back.
A smart man knew the difference between possessing and being possessed. A wise man knew when he was both. At that precise moment, while Cale was wrapped tightly in Hanna’s embrace and he held her captive in his, Cale became a wise man indeed. He acknowledged that nothing had ever hit him with such overwhelming intensity. Nothing compared to, or had prepared him for, this unparalleled experience of passion that demanded the willing participation of mind, body and spirit. Making love with Hanna blew the stars around and turned his world upside down. It was as simple and as complicated as that.
In the aftermath of the total and complete destruction of his self-control and his ability to process thought, Cale collapsed and struggled to draw breath. He felt as if a train that went by the name of Hanna had hit him head-on.
Of course, he couldn’t tell her that she’d just found her true calling in life. She could pitch the paint, knitting needles and writing supplies out the window because she excelled at lovemaking. It pleased him immensely to know that he alone had discovered her hidden talents.
“Well, I can tell you right now that I’ve either been purposely lied to or my friends have wed the wrong men. For the life of me I don’t know why I spent three hours worrying myself into a nervous frenzy,” Hanna declared.
She smiled impishly when Cale raised his tousled head, cocked a thick brow, stared dazedly at her and said, “Huh?”
“I was told that wifely duties were to be tolerated periodically. It was an outright lie. That was incredible.” And it was. She’d never felt so weightless and free. It was the most incredible contradiction. While Cale pinned her down, his powerful body joined intimately with hers, she’d felt as if she could fly unrestrained. She had never experienced such exhilarating, mind-boggling pleasure in her life. But Cale obviously had…
The sudden thought burst her euphoric bubble and sent her crashing back to reality. “Get off me,” she demanded.