A Taste of Heaven

by Alexis Harrington

  “I don't believe you.”

  Abrupt silence fell in the kitchen and they stared at each other, entrenched and breathing hard. Libby wore an expression of utter distrust.

  Breaking this stalemate, Tyler strode around the end of the table and grabbed Libby's wrist. “Come on.” He pulled her along toward the door to the dining room.

  Libby caught a glimpse of glittering anger in his eyes, and for the first time she felt real terror. Though she tried to free her arm, it was useless—she couldn't break his grip. In the space of a breath, she'd lost command of the situation and Tyler, with a hot, feral energy, seized it. She'd never seen him so furious, or so dangerous.

  She looked up at his straight back, and narrow waist and hips as he dragged her up the stairs. His chaps slapped softly against the legs of his jeans, his spurs clinked with each thunderous footfall. “Tyler, let go of me. You can't mean to do this.”

  He didn't answer, but proceeded to the end of the gallery and his own closed bedroom door. Libby trotted behind, afraid to envision the magnitude of the punishment awaiting her.

  Finally, he turned to her. “You've punched me in the stomach, slapped me with a dishrag, and lashed me with that tongue of yours more than once. I took it—sometimes I guess I even deserved it. But to call me a liar, to say that my word is no good—” He twisted the knob, nearly yanking it off, and flung the door open. It banged off the wall and bounced forward.

  The room stood as they'd left it four days earlier, with the window open and the bedding in a tangle. The hard, gold sundown cast a long rectangle on the floor and wall. Tyler pulled her into the room and kicked the door closed behind them. Libby hung back, but he hauled her to the bed, and she recoiled. Twisting and struggling, she tried to get away.

  “Hold still, damn it!”

  “Tyler, God, please—don't do this—” She closed her eyes, feeling as though she stood before a firing squad, and expected him to push her to the mattress.

  Instead, he reached out and threw the pillows aside, and began rifling through the sheets and quilts. All the while he kept her wrist locked in his fingers. Baffled, she watched as he impatiently stripped the bed down to the bare mattress. Cursing violently, he flung that against the wall as though it were weightless. Then, through the slats she saw a piece of paper, folded once, resting on the hardwood floor underneath. He bent down and snatched it up. Releasing her arm, he unfolded it and shoved it into her hands, crumpling it with the force.

  “Here,” he said. “Read it.”

  Libby lifted her gaze to his face. Beneath his anger, she saw pain. “But it was under the bed. How could I—”

  “Read it!”

  She dropped her eyes to the pen strokes.

  Dear Libby,

  Nothing could have forced me from your side this

  morning but an errand in Billings that just won't wait.

  I'll be back as soon as I can.

  I love you, too.

  Tyler

  The words blurred as tears welled in her eyes. I love you, too . . . He'd heard her the night she whispered to him. She pressed a shaking hand to her mouth and looked up at him again. “Tyler, I'm sorry—”

  His anger seemed to drain away all at once, apparently taking with it whatever energy he'd had left. He walked to the mattress where it lay and sat down heavily, sprawling his long legs and leaning against the wall.

  “Not exactly what you were thinking?” He looked suddenly haggard. He scraped his hair back with both hands.

  She took a step closer to him, and held out the note. “But—but if this is how you feel, why are you firing me?”

  Sighing, he dug two fingers into his front pants pocket and pulled out a tiny box that he closed in his hand. “I sure pictured this moment differently,” he muttered with a trace of regret. “Come and sit down.” He patted the mattress next to him.

  Libby approached gingerly, and perched two feet away, clutching the paper to her breast.

  “It's true that I don't want you cooking for the crew anymore. That's one of the reasons I went to Billings. But I'm not firing you, Libby.” He edged closer to her and took her hand in his. “I want to marry you.”

  She couldn't quite get her breath. “Marry me?”

  He looked at her fingers laying across his palm, and ran his thumb along the length of each one. “Yeah, if you'll have me. I'm not always the easiest man to get along with—huh, I guess you already know that. But you make me feel good whenever I'm around you. You gave me back my life.” His tired face was full of emotion, and tears edged his eyes. “God, woman, why do you think I turned Miles City upside down looking for you? Just because I like your biscuits and gravy?” He pressed her hand to his mouth and kissed it. “I love you so much, it scared me to death when I realized it. I didn't want to love anyone again—I didn't think I could. But I don't know how I'd have stood it if you'd gotten on the train back to Chicago.”

  “Oh, Tyler, I’m sorry for the things I said,” she whispered, her own eyes wet. She reached up and brushed her hand through his hair. “It was just that—maybe you realize just a little why I misunderstood when I overheard you and Joe the other morning?”

  He nodded. "And I’m sorry as hell for what those damned Brandauers did to you.” He opened his hand and held out the tiny black velvet box he'd pulled from his pocket.

  Slowly, she took it from his palm. “For me?”

  “That's the other reason I had to go to Billings. Nort Osmer has wedding bands, but he doesn't sell diamonds.”

  She opened the spring-hinged box and found a beautiful engagement ring inside.

  “I can't change the past, but I’d like to make up to you some of the things you missed, if you'll let me. Will you, Libby? Will you marry me?”

  With a cry, she flung herself into his embrace and threw her arms around his neck. “Yes, oh, yes, I will!”

  He buried his face in her hair. “Thank God,” he mumbled with a voice that broke. He held her tight for several moments, rocking her. She felt a deep, shuddering breath wrack his body, and she knew without looking that his tears were wetting her hair.

  They remained entwined for a while in the hush of the sundown, not moving. From the open window, she heard the last of the day's larks call out as they winged to their nesting places for the night. Libby had never felt such peace and security.

  Finally, Tyler took the ring from the box and slid it onto her finger. Pressing a kiss to her knuckles, he looked up from her hand and murmured, “You're mine, Libby, now and forever. Don't forget that.”

  The timbre of his voice changed, and a delicious shiver flew down her spine. “And will you claim what is yours?”

  His eyes, now smoky again, locked with hers. “I didn't ride fifty hard miles today for any other reason.” He looked down at the front of his dusty shirt. “I'm not too clean though.”

  “I don't care. I’ll take you clean—or dirty.” She cupped his face in her hands, feeling the scratch of his day-old beard, and drew his mouth to hers. “I love you, Tyler,” she said softly, her lips less than an inch from his.

  Tyler groaned. “I love you, too, Libby.” He consumed her soft, pink mouth in a kiss, while he sank his fingers into her hair. Her innocent seduction sparked a fire in his blood that made him grateful this was not their first time together. Fierce hunger drove out some of the forbearing gentleness that he'd needed for taking her virginity.

  Now a hot, predatory instinct licked through him, a powerful desire to possess her and make her his. To take her here, now. He deepened the kiss and laid her down on the bare mattress. His tongue sought the slick warmth of her mouth as his lips moved over hers with rising urgency. Each little noise that rose from her throat only made the flames in him burn higher.

  He rose on one elbow and tried to open the buttons on her bodice, but in his impatience, he only popped off the first two.

  “Here, let me,” she said, and he watched with ravenous eyes as the front of her dress parted to reveal her camisole
underneath. Reaching for its pale blue ribbons, he pulled on them to open the garment, and swallowed hard at what he saw. Smooth, full breasts with dusky rose nipples. Soft, white shoulders. A long creamy throat. Her body warmth coursed her sweet vanilla scent to him in waves.

  “God, Libby, you take my breath away,” he said thickly. "I just can't . . . help myself—”

  Supporting her breast with his hand, he dipped his head to close his lips on her nipple. Libby gasped softly, shattered by the nearly unbearable pleasure of suckling him. She threaded her fingers through his thick hair, quickened by the slight rasp of his beard on her tender flesh.

  He pulled back and she greedily reached for the front of his shirt, but he grasped her hand and pulled it lower to his fly buttons. Behind them, Libby felt the proof of his arousal, and his heat. Drawing a ragged breath, he pressed into her palm, pushing hard, and an answering hot pulse began low in her abdomen.

  As if sensing that, Tyler reached beneath her skirt, trailing his fingers up the inside of her leg, past the top of her stocking and on to the thin muslin of her drawers. He put his hand between her thighs, and she knew he must feel the damp heat gathering under the fabric.

  “Tyler,” she moaned.

  "Yes, honey,” he answered.

  He sat up then and kicked off his boots, the spurs digging into the hardwood floor. His shirt he threw to the other side of the room. Shucking off his chaps, he unbuckled his belt and opened his pants. Libby was mildly surprised to see that he'd not bothered to put on underwear, but that fact was curiously arousing.

  He lay down beside her, naked, fully erect, and beautifully male. The clean, carved lines of muscle and bone were as graceful as any sculptor had ever dreamed of.

  “Touch me, Libby,” he whispered urgently.

  A bit timid, she reached for his hard fullness and closed her hand around him, repeating what he'd liked their first night together. A hard-edged moan rose from his throat, and she felt quite pleased with herself and his response. She continued for another moment, until he pushed her hand away.

  “In you, honey, not on you.”

  Garment by garment, he pulled off her remaining clothes, replacing them with trails of flushed, urgent kisses on her bare skin. Only dimly did she realize that she rocked her pelvis against him.

  “I know what you want,” Tyler muttered in her ear.

  He let his hand drift down her belly to reach for her wet, throbbing flesh again. His gentle, probing touch evoked sensations that were almost painful in their intensity. Libby gasped as his fingertips caressed the delicate, swollen tissues, and she pushed up to his hand. Instead of withdrawing as he had last time, he continued the slippery, rapid strokes, until she thought her heart would burst from her chest. It was as if a coil in her wound tighter and tighter, and just one touch would release the constricting pressure.

  “Tyler—oh, God—please, please—”

  Tyler knew. The strokes came faster. He crooned to her in a breathless groan. “This is what you need, right here. Right . . . here.”

  Suddenly, her muscles constricted and hovered on the brink of quivering silence. Then the one touch she'd been waiting for tripped the tight coil and her body convulsed with spasm upon spasm of excruciating pleasure. Libby turned her face against Tyler's chest and sobbed his name in a high, thin cry.

  Ready to explode, Tyler gave Libby no time to catch her breath before he pulled her under him and parted her legs. He entered her with one smooth stroke. She drew a sharp breath, and lifted her hips to receive him. He wanted to keep his thrusts long and slow. But as soon as he sank into her warmth, he knew he was lost to her. He'd mark her soul with his body, if he could. He knew she'd already marked his.

  The acute heaviness low in his belly and groin grew more fevered with each passing second. He gripped Libby's buttocks and canted her to reach into her more deeply. Her fingers bit into his hips and she pulled him toward her as he pushed.

  He looked at her lying beneath him—beautiful, tender. Her eyes were charcoal with rebuilding passion, and her wordless murmuring only increased his need to relieve this aching, exquisite torment.

  He devoured her mouth with a moist, hot kiss, “I'll never let you go,” he ground out.

  “Then take me, Tyler,” she pleaded fervently. “Make me yours.”

  “Libby—angel,” he muttered against her neck. He quickened his pounding strokes, and sweat popped out all over his body.

  Suddenly she arched against him with a wailing sob, her climax vanquishing her. He felt the paroxysms within her that began a chain reaction in his own body. He pressed his forehead to hers and plunged forward, as swift, hot pulsations overwhelmed him.

  Libby wrapped her arms around Tyler and held him close while a shuddering groan was torn from his chest. They lay still then, both spent and breathing hard.

  The evening breeze from the open window swept over their damp bodies, cooling them and raising goose bumps. Limbs entangled, they fell into a brief, languorous doze, still joined. Finally, Tyler slowly roused himself and pulled her over to lie against him.

  He rubbed a hand over his face, and the scrape of his beard bristle on his palm sounded like sandpaper. A wry chuckle escaped him. “I probably look like hell, but I sure feel great.”

  Libby propped herself on one elbow to consider his handsome, drowsy face in the twilight. Maybe he wasn't at his best. He smelled of horses and road dust. His lean jaws were shadowed by stubble, and his sweat-soaked hair stuck up in a couple of places where he'd run his hands through it. But he couldn't have looked better to her if he'd been wearing a Sunday suit. “You're the handsomest cowboy I've ever seen.”

  He raised his brows, obviously struggling to keep a straight face. “That's a real, compliment coming from a city gal.”

  “You always made that sound like a disease,” she complained with a laugh. “I'm sorry to have to tell you this, Miss Libby,” she went on with a deep, mock-stern voice, “but you have a bad case of . . . city-born.”

  He laughed, too. “All right, all right—I agree you fared much better than some who've come West.”

  She lifted her chin with an air of feigned arrogance. “Besides, I'm not a ‘city gal’ anymore.”

  He gazed at her with quiet reverence, and combed his fingers through her tangled hair. “No, you're not, sweetheart. And below that soft, pretty surface, there's a strong, brave woman. That was one of the reasons I fell in love with you.”

  She traced her finger across his lips. "I fell in love with you because I discovered the tender man hiding underneath a tough, hard mask.” She arched a brow at him. “It took some work to find him, though.”

  He chuckled again and pulled her back down to his shoulder. “I'm glad you didn't give up.”

  She snuggled against him. “Well, you're stuck with me now.”

  Now and forever. Tyler turned his head to press kisses to the outer corner of her eye and her cheek. He'd sworn to her that he'd never let her go.

  How could he, he thought, a bit ruefully, when she had such a tight grasp on his own heart?

  Chapter Sixteen

  The next morning, Tyler surprised Libby by coming into the kitchen while the crew was making short work of her pancakes. When he walked in, conversation ceased abruptly. She raised her brows and smiled at him. It would take a little more exposure to his easygoing side to get them used to this new Tyler Hollins—a man who smiled more than he frowned.

  She could not keep her eyes off him. Had there ever been a man so handsome? His eyes had a wicked sparkle in them this morning, and he looked far more rested even though she knew that he'd slept only about three hours.

  Catching her gaze, he winked at her and she blushed hotly, remembering how they'd spent the rest of the night. After she'd helped him put his bed back together, he washed and shaved, and came to her again in her room. This time, they made love slowly, exploring each other's bodies with curious, gentle caresses.

  Tyler stood at the worktable and faced the men. “I
don't mean to interrupt your breakfast, and I know Joe has that schedule he likes to keep, so this will take only a minute.” He smiled at the foreman, and a quiet chuckle rippled, through the group—everyone knew that Tyler was the schedule maker at the Lodestar.

  “You boys probably heard that I went to Billings. I found a new cook there. He used to work for the DHS outfit over in the Judith Basin, and he'll be here in about a month's time to take over this kitchen.”

  All eyes shifted to Libby, with some awkward stirring and throat clearing. Rory watched Tyler, and a slight frown creased his brow. Only Joe grinned.

  Tyler paused a beat before going on, obviously enjoying the suspense. “I fired Miss Libby last night when she agreed to marry me.”

  Libby stared at him with her mouth open. He was such a private man, one who shared his thoughts and feelings with nobody—this was the last thing she expected him to say. He winked at her again, and suddenly she realized what he had done. By making this public announcement of their engagement, he'd expanded the scope of his commitment to her. It wasn't a secret, or an unsubstantial promise made in the dark. It was real. And he wanted everyone to know it.

  The cheers and whistles and applause that erupted in the room were deafening. Tyler held his hand out to her and she joined him at the worktable, blushing and laughing.

  Joe stood up and came to pump Tyler's hand. “So you did it, you stubborn bast—son of a gun.”

  “Yeah, I did it.” Tyler held up Libby's left hand and showed him the ring.

  Joe kissed Libby's cheek, grazing her with his big mustache. “He said he was gonna ask you, but I'll tell you, Miss Libby,” he rumbled in a confidential tone, “I nearly wrung this boy's neck a time or two, waitin' for him to come to his senses.”

  She whispered back, “If I'd known, I probably would have helped you.”

  His dark eyes gleamed and he laughed again, then he shook her hand. “Welcome to the Lodestar, Miss Libby. We're sure glad you're here to stay, even if Tyler is takin' the best damned cook we ever had.”