Incredulous, Finn grabbed Dallas’s arm. “Do you mean to say you’re including me brother and meself as well as Ma and Da? Can it be you’re really asking us to live here in this grand house with you and our sister?”
“Reckon you and Mac will both find your own places and start families soon enough, but, yes, you’re welcome here.” Dallas wished he meant it. His wife’s brothers were a peculiar pair he’d yet to understand.
“What about Vourneen?” Mac asked.
Brendan said, “Lad, she’s too young to wed, and you know it.” He turned to Dallas. “She’s turned sixteen, you see, but she’s that young in ways she acts much younger.”
Dallas remembered the girlish flirt and agreed with his father-in-law. Vourneen had the body of a woman, but the temperament and mind of a girl eleven or twelve.
Mac didn’t agree. His face clouded, and he clenched his fists. “She’s old enough to know she loves me.”
Aoife said, “You’re but eighteen yourself, son. Give her time. Keep in touch with her, and if she still feels the same in two years, we can send for her.”
“I’m no boy, and I know me own mind. Vourneen and I are plenty old enough to wed,” he yelled. “You’ve let this outsider turn your head and set you against your own son. I wish to bloody hell we’d never seen him.”
Dallas felt like the turkey at a shooting match. He didn’t know whether to defend himself or stay out of it.
Cenora solved his dilemma. She stepped up to Mac and stabbed at his chest with her finger. “Cease! You’ll not be causing a row in this home our first night here. Shut your gob and let Ma and Da get some rest.”
To Dallas’s surprise, Mac settled down in the face of his sister’s anger, but he glared at his parents then at Cenora.
“This ain’t over,” he muttered and stomped out.
Finn shrugged and went after him. He called over his shoulder, “I’ll go back with him and calm him down. I’m bringing our things tomorrow.” He nodded at Dallas. “Afore Himself changes his mind about having us here.”
“We’ve an extra lantern if you need it to light your way.” Dallas fetched the lantern and walked Finn to the door. “If there’s trouble from Williams when you start with the wagons tomorrow, let me know.”
“We’ll be for leaving early, afore that one is about.”
Dallas had kept a candle for his and Cenora’s use, and when he’d lit it, he and Cenora bid her parents good night and closed the bedroom door behind them as they left.
“You’ll be walking me to that necessary, won’t you?”
He fetched another lantern from the kitchen and blew out the candle he left on the sink. Guiding his wife to the privy, he kept the lantern high so she wouldn’t stumble.
She tugged at his arm. “Now hold it aloft and scare away any creatures lurking inside, waiting to pounce on me bare backside.”
He held the light while she inspected every corner in the privy and shooed out a large wolf spider. Then, she took the lantern. Flashing a smile over her shoulder, she closed the door and left him standing in the dark.
Instead of waiting his turn, Dallas watered the yard while he waited. When he’d refastened his britches, he moved back near the convenience’s door. “Why are you afraid of an enclosed privy when you’ve used a bush for most of your life?”
From inside the privy she said, “Akh, ‘tis always a chore for a woman to bare herself, but indoors like this is being trapped with whatever creatures lurk about. Can I not run away if I’m outside?”
A thought occurred to him. “Cenora, have you ever been inside a privy before?”
“Aye, but it was long ago.” She giggled. “A toad jumped at me behind, and I almost fell down the hole.”
He tried to suppress his amusement, but it erupted in a laugh. “No wonder you’re cautious.” He figured there was an awful lot about her he didn’t understand, but he chalked up one more thing he knew.
“A proper husband would not poke fun at his wife’s misfortune,” she said and opened the door but smiled at her own folly.
“Looks like your folks have turned in.” No light shone from the windows of the room Cenora’s folks shared.
She giggled again, and her silver laughter sent ripples of pleasure through him. The thought surprised him, and he stumbled. When had her giggle ceased to annoy him?
They hurried into the house, and he closed the back door. At last, he could take his wife to their bed where they’d have the whole top floor to themselves.
He lit the candle he’d left earlier and doused the lantern before returning it to the hook. He followed the same routine whenever he took the lantern so it would always be there for the next time. Dallas tugged Cenora behind him as he raced up the stairs.
“You’re fair dragging me, man. Show a care o’ me leg bones, will you?”
“I have plans for those lovely, long leg bones,” he promised, but slowed his stride.
“Thank you,” she said, fanning her face with her fingers. Then she tugged on his hand. “Saints preserve us, right now all me thoughts of legs are of winding me own around you.”
“How can you expect me to walk slowly when you talk like that?” He blew out the candle and scooped her up.
She nestled against him, and her sigh fanned her sweet breath against his neck as he hurried to their room.
When they were inside, he kicked the door shut and set her on the bed. He closed the curtains and lit the bedside lamp. Soft light played across her perfect features.
“At last we have privacy without cracks the next morning about our creaking wagon.”
“And tonight when we sleep ‘twill be in a bed that fits yourself with room for me as well.”
“That’s the best part, Cenora, you’ll be beside me.”
He meant it, and the thought hit him hard. He’d been plenty mad at their forced union. Still was, in fact, no matter how much he enjoyed their couplings. Considering himself a loner, he hated having a crowd around. But he hadn’t realized how comforting sharing his life with a woman might be.
The right woman, that is. Dang, he hoped Cenora was the right one. Like it or not, and whether or not those vows were legally binding, he was honor bound stuck with her. Now, it looked as if he had her family as well.
“I didn’t know to bring me night clothes,” she said with a coquettish glance and slid off the bed to meet him.
After he kicked off his boots and socks, he caught her hands in his. “You won’t need a thing.”
She giggled again, and he pulled her to him. His blood boiled when she returned his kiss. He’d been horny as Xavier’s goat since the first minute he thought of Cenora in his bed. No longer a shy miss, she met his tongue with her own. When he thought his head would explode from the skyrockets her mouth ignited, he broke the kiss.
Her rose scent filled him, and he thought he would never tire of it. She fumbled with his shirt buttons then pushed it from his shoulders.
“Yours is a very broad chest.”
Her fingers skimmed across him, and his need for her magnified. When she traced the whorls of his nipple, he thought his knees might give way. He stilled her hand.
“There’s something I want from you, have wanted since we met.”
Fear sprang into her widened emerald eyes and she paled. Dang, he cursed himself for frightening her and her for not trusting him.
Her voice trembled. “Wh—What would you be asking?”
“Dance for me.” He knew it sounded crazy, but he’d imagined this for days.
She looked askance. “Here? But ‘tis your bedroom, and not a note ‘o music playing.”
“Our bedroom, and you can sing or hear the music in your head to keep time.”
“But—”
“Please? Not for coins or where others can see, but only for me.”
A slow smile spread across her face, and she cocked her head to one side. “Aye, I see now. If ‘tis for your pleasure, then ‘twill be mine.”
After she took o
ff her shoes and stockings, she spun away. But not in the regimented dance he’d seen when other women accompanied her. This time she took the red scarf from her waist and used it as an instrument meant to entice a man.
Her man.
Him.
She twirled as if to a measured rhythm only she heard. Her green skirt and white petticoats billowed out to reveal long, perfect legs. Legs he wanted around him. She slid the scarf in imitation of a caress along her slender arms. Then she moved the red silk along her body.
Dang, he was hot as a gunslinger’s pistol and just as hard. His manhood strained against his britches until he thought he’d pop through the fabric. He loosened the buttons and stepped from his clothes, never taking his gaze from her. Reaching behind him, he turned back the bedding and sat on the sheet.
Before his heat warmed the cool fabric, she pulled him to the middle of the room and circled around him. He pivoted, naked as a newborn, and watched her every move. Dipping, fluttering, and arching her lithe frame, she lured him with each sinuous flow of her body.
Flush with the throbbing pulsating through him, he pictured himself plunging into her again and again as she wound around him. Her erotic gyrations set his already heated blood at a boil, but he stood mesmerized by her and the dance.
Her flaming hair streamed around her in a fiery cloud. She looped the scarf over his head, and the red silk left a tingling trail across his shoulders and down his right arm. Then she threaded it around her own shoulders and sawed it while she shrugged first one shoulder up and then the other one. Fabric of her blouse pulled taut against her full breasts and pushed the peaked nipples into view.
Dang, he couldn’t take much more of this, or he’d explode like fireworks on the Fourth of July. On and on she whirled and kicked, first coming near to brush against him, then moving back with a captivating smile. Teasing him with the piece of silk as she pulled it across his body, she seared him with her touch and made him part of her beguiling ritual.
When he could stand it no longer, he said, “Come here, let’s dance together in bed.” To his ears, his voice rasped hoarse with the need that burned inside him.
She approached slowly, seductively, with fluid grace. As she moved, she drew off her remaining clothes. Twining the scarf around his wrists, she pulled his arms high until she slid under them, imprisoning him and herself in their circle.
“Now we are truly bound together,” she said, her voice breathy from her exotic dance.
“Am I your prisoner, then?” he asked, amused at her tempting play even as her touch fueled his need.
“Yes, and I am yours.” She met his gaze, but her jewel eyes held uncertainty. “Did I please you then, or was I too forward with meself?”
“You are beautiful and graceful, and your dance was even more special than I’d hoped.”
She breathed a big sigh. “Then you approve and will be taking me to bed now?”
“I suppose I must do as you say, since I’m your prisoner.” He nibbled at her neck, and she released the scarf binding him. The silk fell from his skin as her arms slid around his shoulders.
Their lips met, and he delved his tongue to sample her nectar. She responded with fervor. He rejoiced that if he must be tied to this woman, at least she shared his apparently boundless passion. He pulled her with him across the bed, then scooted her until she lay cushioned in the center of the thick mattress.
“Finally, I can see and taste all of you.”
“I’m hoping ‘tis all right for us to act so heathen.”
He lay propped on an elbow beside her, content for a moment to look his fill of her. “It isn’t heathen for a husband and wife to enjoy one another. Doesn’t it feel right?”
In the golden lamplight, her skin gleamed like ivory.
“Aye, it feels more than right. It’s as if being with you is where I was meant to be.”
He smoothed her auburn hair across the pillow. It looked even more glorious there than he had dreamed. Desire darkened her emerald eyes, and the pink of exertion tinged her cheeks.
“No woman will ever be more beautiful than you are right now.”
“If you think that, then we’re well matched, for never lived a more handsome man than you are.”
He took her graceful hand in his and brought it to his lips. After he pressed a kiss to her palm, he suckled each fingertip.
She pulled away and put her hands under her. “You’ll be driving me mad with wanting. Hurry.”
He smiled down at her and shook his head. “Nope. I’ve thought about this night since we wed. Reckon we might not get much sleep, for I intend to take my time.”
“But ‘tis torture waiting.” She reached for his manhood.
He twisted away. “Let me give you something to think about, then.” Starting with her beautiful eyes, he rained kisses on her face, her neck, and her shoulders. He cradled one of her ample breasts while his mouth suckled the other.
She moaned and clutched him to her.
In spite of his throbbing need, he restrained his own urgency and slowly trailed kisses down her ribs, her stomach, to her mound of curls. He slid a finger inside her moist heat.
“Now, Dallas, now. I can’t wait another second.”
Desire won, and he stretched himself over her. “Nor can I,” he said and slid into her. “Let’s begin our own dance.
Chapter 8
Cenora rested her head on Dallas’s chest, exhausted from their coming together. Outside, sounds had died, and she heard only the insects hitting the screened windows and the occasional whinny of a horse. Inside, sweat dampened the sheets beneath her, and she detected the warm, stale scent she'd come to associate with their heated couplings.
“‘Tis a wondrous thing, this mating between us. I wonder if any woman is as blessed as meself.”
At once she remembered his wounds and worried they’d damaged his healing. “Roll over now and let me check the back of ye. We might have opened the wounds.” Though they had healed over, she knew they still ached and bothered him. Ma had done her best, but Cenora worried his shoulder hadn’t healed properly from the inside.
“My shoulder’s fine, though the rest of me is worn to a cinder.” But he rolled over as she’d asked, then he said, “You’re an enchantress.”
“And didn’t I tell you I’m a woman with experience now to please you?” She smoothed her hand across the angry wound, but found no sign of blood.
“Thank heavens for experienced women.” He rolled to his back.
“Not women. One woman. You need concern yourself only with me and not be wandering off to sample others.”
“Never would with you here.” His promise sounded as if he meant it. “Never break my word.”
Easy for him to say, but hadn’t she overheard him tell his uncle he had no wish to be wed that morn in the wagon? He’d said it twice, so there was no mistaking his meaning. She’d almost died, for she knew young Daniel must have heard as well, but he didn’t let on.
Neither did she, though the words burned a hole in her heart. Bad enough to know her husband wed against his will. From his actions afterward, she’d thought he grew to like having her around. He said she talked too much and thought her superstitions were silly. Well, if he sent her away, so be it, but she’d make him want her if she could.
What would it be like if this man loved her? Wouldn’t that be heavenly? A more handsome man she’d never seen, and he’d been kind to her for all he never said much. Mayhap that was better than blathering on like Da. When she remembered how her brazen actions led to their forced wedding, the guilt weighed her down. Of course he couldn’t love such as her—a weak, deceitful woman.
She forced herself to calm and smile at her man while she had him. “Good to know you won’t wander. ‘Tis easy for a man to stray elsewhere while his woman is left at home. At least that’s what I hear about you people.”
He rose on his elbow and met her gaze. A frown furrowed his brow and anger sparked in his eyes. “You people? Are yo
u not now a part of whatever people I am?”
Oh, no, she hadn’t meant to say that. One mistake after the other. “I-I only meant, weel, country or settled folks. ‘Tis what we, um, I mean, they, the traveling folks call the people who aren’t Travelers. You know, those who live in houses—buffers, or settled, or country people. We heard how many country men cheat on their wives and how some country wives cheat on their husbands. But mainly, we heard about the men.”
“Do no Traveler men cheat? And you told me Williams and one or two others beat their wives. How is this different than country men? Could that talk have been only meant to warn women away from any save Travelers?”
She weighed this new information. “Mayhap. Though sometimes Williams would arrange a marriage o’ one o’ our girls to an outsider and receive money which went to her parents.”
“You mean the, um, country man paid a bride price?” Dallas asked.
She nodded. “But ’tis not the way it was done with O’Leary as leader.” She lowered her voice as if telling a secret. “‘Tis Da’s opinion Williams kept part o’ the price for himself.”
“Your parents asked me for no bride price.”
Thinking to tease him a bit, she said, “Weel, now, it was different for us, but the old custom would be for the young man to work for the girl’s father a year or more before the marriage to earn the bride.”
Shock showed on his face. “Doing what?”
“Whatever the bride’s father needed. If her father was a tinker, the young man would learn to repair metal. Or if the father repaired clocks, then the young man would learn to repair clocks. You see? And he got almost no wages, but it all went to the girl’s dowry to give the couple a start in life, and at the same time, the lad learned a living trade.”
He shook his head in what she suspected to be disbelief. “Good thing we didn’t have to go through that, for I can neither sing nor dance, and I’m spare of words. Don’t think your father could teach me something I’ve no ability for.”
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