“Congratulations, son.” His father hugged him hard and then turned to take both of Rebecca’s hands in his. “I know you’re going to make Zach happy. I hope this marriage turns out as well as those of my other two children have. My best wishes for a long and fruitful life for both of you.”
This was getting worse and worse. He watched with alarm as his tearful mother hugged her new daughter-in-law.
“Welcome to the family, Rebecca. I wasn’t in favor of Zach’s method of choosing a wife, but I’m so pleased that it brought you to him.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Whitelaw.”
“Please, call me Candy. Or Mom, if you wish.”
Rebecca shot him a look of desperation, and Zach recognized her dilemma. To call his mom “Candy” would be to deny the relationship his mother so obviously hoped would develop between them. To call her “Mom” was to set everyone up for greater heartache if the marriage ended in a year.
Zach came to his wife’s rescue, slipping his arm around her waist and pulling her snug against his side. “Thanks, Mom,” he said, saving Rebecca from having to say anything at all.
“I’ve got a wedding cake and some supper at Hawk’s Way for everybody,” his mother said. “Will you and Rebecca come?”
How could he deny the look of entreaty in his mother’s eyes? He fought the grimace and managed a crooked smile. “Sure, Mom. Becky and I have to make a stop by the house first, but we’ll be there.”
To Zach’s mortification, his sister had brought rice for everyone to throw on the courthouse steps—only, it was birdseed instead of rice. It wasn’t entirely inappropriate to observe that ritual of fertility, he thought. But it was one more indication that his family expected the marriage to thrive and prosper. He hoped and prayed it did.
He grabbed Rebecca’s hand and ran for his pickup, dragging her behind, only to discover that Just Married had been scrawled across the back window with shaving cream, and a host of boots and cans had been tied to the back end.
He wanted to laugh and curse at the same time. Didn’t they get it? It wasn’t real. He had married for convenience. He didn’t want all these trappings. They made him uncomfortable and forced him to confront the utter unfairness of the bargain he had made with Rebecca.
From the grim look on her face, she wasn’t any more happy with the situation than he was.
Zach heard the shouts of laughter as he picked Rebecca up and practically threw her into the seat of the pickup before running around the hood and letting himself inside. He gunned the engine and peeled rubber as he left the cluster of well-wishers behind.
As soon as he hit the edge of town, he slowed down.
“Is there something you really want from the house, or was that a ploy to avoid your family for a little while longer?”
Zach sighed. “Was it that obvious?”
“It was to me. I don’t think your family noticed. They have no idea, do they, Zach, about the truth of our relationship?”
“No.”
Rebecca groaned. “I can’t possibly call your mother ‘Mom’ under the circumstances. But I’m afraid otherwise I’ll hurt her feelings.”
“Then call her ‘Mom,’” Zach said irritably.
“What if I don’t get pregnant, Zach? What if this all turns out to be a farce?”
“We’ll worry about that when the time comes. Right now, we just do what’s necessary to get through the day.”
Zach stopped at the house, knowing he had to pick something up or have his lie exposed. When he stepped inside the house behind Rebecca, he knew exactly why he would have come straight home if this had really been his wedding day. He caught his wife’s wrist and stopped her just inside the kitchen door.
“Hey, kid.”
His voice was low and vibrant, and Rebecca felt a shiver of expectation scurry up her spine. She turned as Zach tugged on her hand until she was facing him. His hand caught under her chin and lifted her face until she had no choice except to look at him.
“Hello, wife.”
It had a good sound, a marvelous sound. “Hello, Zach.” She caught the edge of a frown. Had he expected her to call him husband? She wanted to, desperately. But she had begun to realize that she needed to protect herself if she was going to survive the coming year. Zach had made the rules. She had to follow them. That meant keeping her distance emotionally to the extent it was possible. At least until she was pregnant. Then it would be safe to love him, but not until then.
He made a growling sound in his throat. “Lord, how I want you!”
“Now? But we have to get to Hawk’s Way—”
He shook his head. “Not right away. Not for as long as it would take me to love you.”
Rebecca felt goose bumps the size of eggs pop up on her arms at the thought of repeating what had happened earlier in the day. “Oh, Zach.”
He didn’t need more invitation than that.
“Let’s get out of these clothes,” he said.
Rebecca watched as Zach yanked off his boots, then grabbed for his bolo tie. In moments he was stripped bare. He was already aroused, and she was intimidated by the size of him.
She had dragged her dress off and quickly slipped out of the silk bra and panties that were all she had worn under the buckskin, but Zach was way ahead of her.
“Leave the moccasins on,” he said in a sharp voice.
Rebecca froze. She was naked except for the headband and moccasins. Somehow she didn’t feel self-conscious, not with the clear look of admiration in Zach’s dark eyes.
He fingered the beaded headband and let his hand smooth down the length of her hair to cup her breast. “You look so beautiful…my very own Indian princess.”
His eyes were heavy-lidded, his nostrils flared for the scent of her. He reached out and drew her close, sliding her into the cradle of his thighs. He lowered his head and touched his lips to hers.
This time Rebecca knew what to expect, or thought she did. Only, this time, Zach was in no hurry at all. He took his time kissing first one side of her mouth, then the other, before stroking the length of her closed lips with his tongue. She gasped, and his tongue slid inside, warm and wet and demanding.
His hands caressed their way down her back to her buttocks and then between her legs, forcing her to spread them so that he could reach her nether lips. Her knees nearly buckled as he slid a finger inside her. And another. His teeth caught on an earlobe and nipped until the pleasure turned to pain. He soothed the hurt with kisses.
Abruptly, he picked her up and carried her toward the bedroom. Only, to her surprise, he didn’t stop there. He shoved open the sliding glass door and stepped out into the sunlight.
The arbor was as beautiful as she had remembered. The air seemed misted with the fragrant scent of wisteria. He laid her down in the cool grass and mantled her body with his own.
She grasped his forearms as he spread her legs with his knees, and gave a startled cry when he thrust inside her to the hilt.
“Are you all right?”
Her blood was racing, her pulse was pounding, but there were flowers overhead and birdsong and sunlight dappled by the giant oak. She was more than all right. “I’m fine, Zach. Oh, I’m very fine.”
He slid his hands beneath her and supported her as he made slow, delicious love to her.
Rebecca began to writhe beneath the onslaught of his mouth and body. She returned the favor, nipping at his shoulder, kissing and touching whatever part of him she could reach.
Zach’s control didn’t last long.
Rebecca was watching his face, so she saw the moment when his eyes closed. He gritted his teeth and then groaned savagely as the pleasure flooded through him.
By then she was no longer watching him. Her eyelids had fallen closed as she threw back her head and gave in to the shudders of intense pleasure racking through her.
They lay together in that lovely bower for long moments afterward. Somehow, Rebecca knew Zach had never been here with Cynthia. For some reason, he hadn’t w
anted to make love to her in the bedroom. She was glad, because here there was no ghost to intrude on their peace.
“We have to get dressed,” Rebecca said when she could breathe easily again. “We have to go to your mother’s party.”
“I hope you get pregnant soon,” he muttered.
Rebecca recoiled. Zach’s comment was like a glass of cold water in her face. It reminded her why he had married her, what one use he had for her, and the reason he had been so willing to make love to her. He wanted her pregnant. His expertise as a lover was a benefit to her, but her pleasure was not a primary reason for their coupling.
“I have to get dressed.” Her words came out sounding sharper, more barbed, than she had expected.
She stood and felt embarrassed suddenly to be still wearing her moccasins. She turned and fled.
Zach had felt Rebecca stiffen in his arms and wondered what he had done to offend her. He hadn’t intended to make love to her in such a frenzy, but once the idea had occurred to him, the need to touch her, to kiss her, to put himself inside her, had been overwhelming.
Instead of taking her to bed, where any sane man would have made love to his brand-new wife, he had carted her outside and laid her in the grass. No wonder she was upset. But he had realized, as he entered the bedroom carrying Rebecca in his arms, that he didn’t want to make love for the first time as man and wife in the bed where he had found Cynthia joined with another man.
He turned onto his stomach in the grass and laid his cheek on his folded arms. He hoped Rebecca was already pregnant. He didn’t want to get to know her any better—and he admitted he was curious about what kind of person she had turned out to be—until he was certain their relationship would be permanent. His family weren’t the only ones who would suffer if there was a divorce. He knew it would be difficult to put experiences like this one behind him and forget Rebecca Littlewolf if she didn’t conceive his child.
Zach returned to the house through the kitchen door, because Rebecca had locked the sliding glass door and he didn’t want to cause a confrontation if he knocked and she refused to let him in. In the kitchen, he put back on his shirt, pants and boots, but left off his jacket and tie.
He found himself pacing the tiled floor as he waited for Rebecca to appear. He resisted the urge to go see what was taking her so long and called to her instead. “Hey, kid! Are you dressed yet?”
He stopped and stared when she appeared in the kitchen doorway. Her eyes were blotchy, and her nose was red. She had obviously been crying. The headband was gone, and so were the moccasins and the Indian dress, for that matter. She was wearing a simple print cotton summer dress with narrow straps that exposed her shoulders, and sandals that left her legs and feet bare. The dress was fitted to the waist and flared into a full skirt. She had gathered her hair into a ponytail so she looked all of seventeen.
His heart lurched.
It was as though he was seeing her for the first time as she really was. A young woman. Very pretty. Open and honest. When he met her glance, he realized the blind trust, which had been there as recently as this morning, was gone. Her green eyes were wary. Her chin trembled.
“I’m ready,” she said in a hoarse voice.
“You’ve been crying.”
“I… It’s been a hectic day.”
“It’s not over yet. Are you sure you want to go to my mother’s party?”
Her chin came up, and her shoulders squared. “Of course.”
She still had gumption, Zach thought. At least that hadn’t changed. “Let’s go, then.”
He stood back and was distressed to see that she shied away as she passed by him. He reached out to stop her. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
“I would never hurt you, kid.”
She turned and looked at him over her shoulder. Her voice was low and vibrated with feeling. “You already have.”
CHAPTER FIVE
REBECCA TOOK A SIP OF COFFEE that burned her tongue and quickly set down her coffee mug. She glanced at Zach, who sat on the opposite side of the kitchen island. “It’s that time of month,” she blurted. Meaning, of course, that she wasn’t pregnant and that they wouldn’t be having intercourse for the next few days.
For the third month since she had married Zach, her period had come exactly on time. She risked a glance at Zach and found his expression as grim-lipped as she had expected it to be. She bit back an apology. It wasn’t for want of trying that she wasn’t pregnant. She and Zach made love at least once every day and sometimes twice. She had begun to look forward to those interludes, because otherwise, Zach avoided her company.
Her dream of making Zach fall in love with her had gone dreadfully awry. On the other hand, she was making tremendous progress on her camp for kids with cancer, which she had—quite cleverly, she thought—dubbed Camp LittleHawk. Zach had done everything she had asked to help make the camp a reality. Unfortunately, she had yet to fulfill her part of the bargain by providing the child he so desperately wanted.
“Maybe I should go see a doctor,” she suggested.
“I think it’s a little soon for that, don’t you?”
“I don’t know what to think,” Rebecca replied irritably.
She had discovered that Zach never argued when he could get his way by completely avoiding a discussion of the subject. She watched him do it now.
“I noticed that both bunkhouses are finished,” he said. “If I’m not mistaken that means you have everything in place for your camp to open. When does the first bunch of kids arrive?”
“Tomorrow,” she said, her face lit by the excitement she felt. “We’ll have an even dozen, six boys and six girls.”
“I met your new assistant yesterday.”
“Rowley? I know he’ll be great with the kids. He always has a smile on his face,” Rebecca said. “It also turns out that he was raised on a ranch, so he’s comfortable around horses and cattle.”
“He’s got a broken arm,” Zach said.
“Well, yes, that’s true,” Rebecca said. “But he’s quite good at saddling horses one-handed.”
Rebecca had first spotted Rowley Holiday hitchhiking along the highway into town with a saddle thrown over his shoulder. Of course, she had stopped to pick him up. At first, the young man had been a bit taciturn, but soon she had him talking about his life as a rodeo bronc rider. His broken arm was a bit of bad luck, he said, that was going to make things a little tough for the six weeks it took his arm to heal.
She liked his enthusiasm for his work and his willingness to shoulder life’s burdens with a smile. The next thing she knew, she was offering him the job as camp counselor.
Like Mrs. Fortunata, Rowley had no credentials for the job. But it wasn’t a conventional kind of camp. Although every child coming to the camp had cancer, they were all in remission or stabilized by treatment. She had arranged to have a doctor on call, but the truth of the matter was, all she needed was a pair of willing hands—or even one good strong one—and an authoritative voice to direct the boys, while she and Mrs. Fortunata took care of the girls.
“It’s perfect,” she had said. “You can spend some time working for me and Zach and then hit the rodeo circuit again.”
“Oh, I don’t know, ma’am…”
That was another thing she liked about the cowboy, his courtesy. “You have to take the job, Rowley. Camp’s starting in a week. I had talked my husband into taking the job, but he’s awful busy with ranch business. You’d be doing us a favor.”
And of course, being the nice sort of man he was, Rowley had accepted the job. She had brought him back to the ranch and told him to make himself at home in the counselor’s suite in the boys’ bunkhouse.
“Is there anybody else you’ve hired that I should know about?” Zach asked.
“Nobody since Mr. Tuttle,” Rebecca said.
“Thank God,” Zach muttered. “And about Tuttle—”
Rebecca didn’t want to argue with Zach about her newest employee, s
o she jumped up and dumped the rest of her coffee in the sink. “I’ve got to get moving, Zach. I’ll see you tonight.”
Zach felt the butterfly touch of her lips on his cheek before Rebecca flitted out the door.
He left the kitchen a moment or two after her, headed for the barn. He watched her fanny sashay across the yard, not quite believing the upheaval in his life since the day three months ago when they had gotten married. It had dawned on him, finally, that Rebecca hadn’t changed much at all since the days when she had roamed Hawk’s Pride with a menagerie of animals in tow. She was still bringing home strays. Only she had graduated to the two-legged variety.
Besides Mrs. Fortunata, who insisted on cooking for them to pay her way until the first campers showed up—and was a passable cook, if you liked a lot of pasta—there was the cowboy with the broken arm, Rowley Something, whom she had hired as a camp counselor, and an arthritic old man, Mr. Tuttle—who couldn’t close his fingers around a pitchfork, let alone lift a bale of hay—whom she had hired to muck out the stalls and feed the dozen-odd ponies she had talked him into buying for the camp.
It wasn’t that he couldn’t afford the salaries. He had started out with a sizable trust fund and had turned a profit with his ranch over the past fifteen years. He could easily be termed a wealthy man.
“But if you keep it up,” he had warned Rebecca, “Hawk’s Pride will become a Mecca for every freeloader in Texas with a sob story.”
She had looked up at him earnestly and said, “I would never let anyone take advantage of your generosity, Zach.”
How was he supposed to respond to a statement like that?
Hog-tied and buffaloed by a bit of female fluff, that’s what he was. He had given up trying to stop her from rescuing the homeless, the helpless and the unhealthy. Her generosity of spirit was simply a part of who she was.
Besides, Mrs. Fortunata was a nice old lady, and Rowley had turned out to be a damned hard worker, even with one hand. And somehow, he had no idea how, Mr. Tuttle kept the stable clean and the ponies fed.
Hawk's Way: Callen & Zach Page 17
