Heather glanced around her. They were indeed causing a scene. Several people were staring, including the desk clerk. Under normal circumstance she might have felt embarrassment, but just now she was too filled with anxiety to care what other people thought. She only wished to be alone with Sloan.
He must have felt similarly. Without waiting for her agreement, Sloan took her hand and pulled her up the elegant mahogany stairway.
“There…” Heather indicated her room when he seemed to be searching along the hallway. He drew her into the room and shut the door behind them.
Once inside, however, he abruptly released her. For a moment he simply stared. “You’ve been crying,” he whispered.
Absently she wiped at the stains on her cheeks. “It doesn’t matter. What… are you doing here?”
“I’ve come to beg you not to leave me.”
“Why?”
“Because I need you. Because Janna needs you.” His voice cracked slightly. “Because I want you for my wife. Please, will you stay?”
Her disbelief showed in her golden eyes. “Why should I?”
“Because I love you,” Sloan replied—too harshly, he realized. He heard Heather’s soft, ragged intake of breath. At her shocked expression, his chest twisted.
“I love you,” he said again, without the sharpness. “Maybe I don’t have the right to ask you to stay, Heather. I know I’ve hurt you … I know I’ve done nothing to deserve your love… But I’m asking you to give me another chance.”
The naked vulnerability in his face struck her like a physical blow. That expression in his eyes, so desperate and haunted, distressed her.
She felt the same desperation. The yearning in her heart was so painful, she thought she might faint.
“You love me?” she whispered, her eyes wide with uncertainty.
“Yes.” How could he not love her? Her devotion to his daughter, her fierce courage, her compassion. … She had faced the harsh challenges of this land, the trials of his failing cattle empire, without flinching. He loved her. Needed her. Even more desperately than she’d once needed him, when she’d been burdened by the crush of financial debts. It had taken nearly losing her to make him realize just how very much.
His heart slamming into his ribs, he took a step closer. “I want to build a future with you, Heather. I want to have children with you. I want to share my life with you. If you don’t want to live on the ranch, I could sell it… We could move somewhere where you could be happy.”
She closed her eyes in wonder, cherishing the words she’d been longing for, waiting for, forever.
“Heather?” he asked, his voice a hoarse rasp. “God, please say something. Tell me if I still have a chance.”
“I… never thought you could love me.”
“I do. As heaven is my witness, I do.” He closed the distance between them, his face harsh with strain. “I didn’t want to. I fought it from the first moment we met. I was afraid to love you, afraid you’d be taken from me like Doe was. You were right. I had to let go of my guilt. But I think I’ve done that, Heather. Doe doesn’t claim my heart any longer, you do. I love you. I can’t live without you. Please…”
She gazed up at him, her beautiful eyes blurred with tears, filled with hope.
Hardly daring to breathe, Sloan reached for her, his shaking hands framing her face beneath her bonnet. He kissed her very slowly, carefully, like he’d found something fragile, precious. Like he would shatter if she turned him away. He was desperate to reclaim her, to bridge the chasm between them with wordless, unbreakable bonds.
He could feel her trembling, feel himself trembling, as he whispered, “Heather, can you ever forgive me?”
She heard the pain in his voice, heard the pleading, and her heart broke. He was so tough, so impenetrable, so vulnerable. “Yes, Sloan … I forgive you.”
He drew back so he could again see her eyes. “You said you loved me. Did you really mean it?”
“Yes, I meant it.” The tears spilled over her eyes; she knew she was crying and couldn’t help it. “I love you. I’ve loved you for so long—”
He stopped her words with his mouth. He hauled her against him and kissed her, deep and fierce this time, telling her without speaking how desperately he needed her, wanted her. When he felt her quivering response, desire filled him, desire and joy and wonder.
He ended the kiss at last, although he didn’t let her go. Instead his arms wrapped around her. He stood holding her close, molding her against him.
“I love you.” His whisper was wild and low. “These last weeks have been a torment. You don’t know how much.”
“Yes, I do.”
“Heather, I want to stop hurting.”
“So do I,” she whispered.
“Then you won’t leave me?”
Nodding against his shoulder, she gave a tearful laugh. “I wasn’t leaving, Sloan. I couldn’t bear to, even knowing you could never love me. I had already decided to return home before you came. Evan had just offered to escort me when you hit him.”
“I went crazy when I saw you kiss him.”
“It was only gratitude.”
“Are you sure?”
“Absolutely sure.”
He seemed to relax, but then he drew back to stare at her, his look intense. “Heather, Wolf gave me part of his gold mine—Doe’s share, he said. I swallowed my pride and took it, mainly for Janna’s sake. The money will let me rebuild the ranch, but if you’d rather live here in Denver, or even St. Louis…”
“But the Bar M is your home. You love it there.”
“I don’t want to live there without you to share it with me.”
She gave a tremulous smile. It warmed her to think Sloan would sacrifice his beloved ranch for her, but she didn’t want him to.
“Sloan, I love it there, too. The Bar M is my home now. I don’t want to leave it, as long as you’re there.”
His blue eyes filled with emotion so fierce it robbed her of breath and heartbeat.
“Sloan… I want to go home,” Heather murmured. “Please, take me home.”
He smiled at her, this tough, tender man who had captured her heart so completely—a smile so brilliant it shamed the sun.
“God, yes, let’s go home.”
She rode before him on his horse because Sloan couldn’t bear to let her out of his arms. They left Heather’s baggage for the hotel to see returned, and set out for home, lost in their own private lovers’ world … murmuring to each other, questioning thoughts, sharing feelings, exploring the tender, fragile dimensions of their love.
There were things that needed to be said, hurt that needed to be acknowledged and banished forever. Promises to be made and kept.
They spoke of the future: of the ranch’s deliverance from debt, as well as plans for their daughter and their hope for other children. They spoke of the past: Sloan’s pain at losing Doe, and of his release, like the lancing of a festered wound.
“I know how much you loved her,” Heather offered, hearing the wistful sadness in his voice.
“Yes, but it doesn’t hurt as much now,” he admitted. “I’ll always cherish her memory, always grieve a little for her, but the pain of losing her is gone. Because of you.” Tenderly, his lips brushed the nape of her neck beneath her bonnet. “You fill the emptiness inside me, Heather.”
Shutting her eyes, she leaned back against him, cherishing his admission and the feel of his arms around her. This was happiness, she thought.
The foothills seemed to welcome them as they grew near. A light breeze carried the fresh scent of pine and set the aspen leaves dancing, while in the distance the rugged peaks of the Rockies rose to touch the blue Colorado sky. The leaves were just beginning to turn. Soon, Sloan knew, the aspens would be coming into their full autumn glory, sending up gold and orange tongues of fire.
They were riding along a stream that bordered a wood when he saw a flicker of movement among the branches of a cottonwood. Abruptly Sloan brought the horse to
a halt and reached for the rifle in its scabbard. But then his hand stilled.
In the dappled sunlight he could make out the fawn color of a deer that had come to drink at the steam. The slender, graceful animal had raised its head to stare at him, but there was no alarm in the gentle brown eyes.
Those eyes reminded him so much of Doe. Maybe it was a trick of the light, but she seemed to be speaking to him. Smiling at him. At Heather. Giving them her blessing.
The sight held Sloan spellbound for a dozen heartbeats. It was only when the doe turned and bounded off that he felt the tension in Heather’s body. She thought he was still haunted by tormenting memories, he suspected.
His arms came around her tightly. “Doe would have been happy for us,” he murmured emphatically. “Happy that I found someone to fill my heart. Happy that I love you.”
He felt her disquiet fade as she leaned back against him.
When they reached the Bar M, Sloan turned his horse over to Rusty to unsaddle and swung a startled Heather up into his arms. Like a husband with his cherished bride, he carried her up to the house and over the threshold of the back door. The place was empty; Caitlin and Jake evidently had taken Janna home with them.
Pausing, Sloan stood holding Heather in the kitchen. “Are you hungry?”
“Not really,” she murmured, struck by a sudden shyness. “Are you?”
His smile was pure sensuality. “Famished—but not for food.”
He carried her purposefully up the stairs to his bedchamber, where he gently set her down. Assailed by fresh doubt, Heather searched his hard, handsome face, wondering if he finally meant for her to share this room, this bed.
There was no reservation in his expression. He looked at her as if she were the only woman on earth, the only one he wanted on earth. “I promise you, Heather,” he said softly. “Doe won’t be sharing this bed with us. I’ve told her good-bye. But if you would rather use another bed, choose another room for our bedroom—”
“No, I want to be here.”
His smile was warm, heartrending. “I want you to be here, too.”
“Are you certain?” she asked thickly as Sloan untied the ribbons of her bonnet and slipped it from her head.
“More certain than anything in my life.”
With a tenderness he’d long denied, he raised her hand and kissed the cup of her palm, then placed it against his chest so she could feel the tempo of his heartbeat. Her lips parted in a breathless murmur of sound.
When she remained mute, Sloan took her face in his hands. “I love you, Heather.” His breath was a raw whisper. “And I mean to spend the rest of my days proving it to you.”
The aching tenderness in his voice reassured her, as did his gaze. She was mesmerized by the emotions playing in his eyes, the love softening his features.
The rugged planes sharpened in intensity as he bent his head and claimed her mouth, yet his kiss was so gentle, so searing, it scalded her heart. His breath filled her, warming her, stealing her soul.
His low murmur of laughter afterward suggested he had felt the same enchantment.
They undressed each other, slowly, intimately, lingering over the simple pleasure of touching. There was no hurry. They had forever. They savored this time together, the familiarity, the inexplicable newness of the moment, their hands searching each other with wonder and tender hunger.
Sloan caught his breath when Heather stood naked before him. Her pale-gold hair fell in rich, deep ripples over her shoulders and down her back—the way it had in his first dream of her.
But she was no dream this time. She was gloriously real. His dream lover in the flesh. She was, he thought, drinking her in, the most beautiful thing he had ever seen or ever would see. She was strength, she was courage. She was joy and triumph. She was his heart.
Longing filled him, as strong, as desperate as the need to breathe.
“I dreamed about you, did you know that?” he said softly. “Before I ever knew you. You haunted me even then.”
Her answering smile was so lovely it made his heart ache.
Needing to touch her, he stepped closer. He wanted to fill his hands with her, to feel her delicate shiver, to hear her uneven breath. He wanted to see wonder and blind pleasure in her eyes. He wanted to see love and trust. He wanted to heal the hurt he had given her....
Only touch could convey his repentance. Reaching for her, Sloan enfolded her in his arms. He felt the sigh whisper through her body as she stood contentedly in his embrace.
“Do you feel the same fire I feel?” he murmured as his hands came up to caress her naked back.
“Yes.”
“It’s been like this since the first moment I saw you.” Quietly, Sloan drew back. “I’m sorry I never told you how much you meant to me.”
Reaching up, she touched her fingers to his lips. “Hush … no regrets. Not now.”
To his surprise she took his hand and led him to the bed. When he lay back, he tried to gather Heather to him, to fit her warm body to his, but she seemed to have other notions.
His breath checked sharply when she knelt on the mattress above him. For a moment his heart almost didn’t beat. Heather held his gaze as deliberately, her knuckles brushed the surging, hard, silky flesh of his erection.
“I want to please you,” she said almost shyly.
Sloan met the soft fire in her eyes and it triggered something primal in him. Desire, heavy and urgent, curled in his loins.
“You always do,” he replied, his voice suddenly ragged.
A tantalizing shudder passed through him as her fingers closed around him. His breathing deepened in quick, steady arousal as she stroked him, caressed him.
Then she bent over him, letting her lips claim his straining flesh. The muscles of his chest contracted; his skin suddenly felt hot and tight.
“Heather…” He was already hard and near to bursting, but her gentle ministrations sent desire rioting in his veins. Her hair spilled like a curtain of silvery silk over his skin as she continued her warm, sensual seduction, her tongue caressing him, tormenting him.
Sloan groaned aloud at the sensation, his face contorted with pleasure and pain. But Heather refused to stop. He moaned her name again, his voice hoarse, dark, just this side of pleading. Her burning lips slid over him, drawing him into a sweet tempest of pleasure.
Blindly Sloan caught his hands in her hair while his hips surged up to meet her feasting mouth.
She was a woman to drive a man crazy… He was crazy. He was filled with the pounding need to possess her, to please her, to love her.
Suddenly he couldn’t bear to wait. He needed her to take him deep inside, to drain him, renew him.
Capturing her shoulders, Sloan shifted her body and rolled over her. As he stared down at her, he was unsurprised to realize his hands were trembling, his body shaking. “Love me, Heather. Please love me…”
“Yes…”
His eyes took on that fierce, intense expression that was so much a part of him as he eased her legs apart. When he pushed into her, she caught him in sleek rippling velvet, gloving him so hot and tight that he felt as if he would come apart.
He moaned raggedly.
With brutal effort, he forced himself to restrain the violence of his desire, but the molten heat in his gaze seared her. “I’m still not close enough,” he said harshly. “I want to share every breath, every beat of your heart.”
He thrust harder, pressing deeper, impaling her. Her body shimmered with fierce response at his savage tenderness.
“Do you need this as much as I do?” he rasped as he began to move.
Those were the last words he spoke for a long while. He took her tenderly, wildly, possessing her completely, until she wept soft, mindless cries of pleasure, of pleading and surrender … until he shook with the force of his desire and love.
It was beyond lovemaking. The melding of their bodies was like a mating of souls, fiery and desperate and joyous with need. And when her explosive release at las
t came, everything within him shattered. He gave her his soul, and she took it willingly.
Afterward, when their slow, shuddering gasps were spent, she lay with her cheek pressed over his heart, her hair spilling like a curtain of silver-gold silk over his skin. As their steady heart rhythms mated with their languorous breathing, Sloan marveled at the frightening, exhilarating experience he’d just endured. Making love to Heather always stunned him. Every time he felt as though he lost a part of himself, because he did.
And yet this time was different from all the others. A deep sense of peace flowed in his veins. The kind of peace he’d never expected to find again.
He’d found it in Heather’s arms. She had given him resurrection.
His frozen heart had thawed under her warmth. She’d taught him to love again, banishing the bleakness in his life. She had brought him alive again. He was alive, furiously, wildly alive....
His arms tightened around her reflexively. This was the woman he needed, the woman he loved. She had become his heartbeat.
“God, I love you,” he whispered fiercely.
Raising her head, Heather returned his gaze mistily. Her heart felt recklessly open and unbearably full. She believed Sloan completely. She could feel it, the love in his touch. Could see the desire and need rampant in his face.
“I love you, too.” He was her husband and she loved him utterly; so much she trembled with it.
“For always?” he demanded huskily.
“Yes,” she whispered. “For always.”
His chest tightened with longing, and when she raised her lips to his, need came crashing into him, more immutable than before.
His mouth closed on hers, claiming her irrevocably. His hands clenched in her hair and he kissed her hungrily, a kiss raw with desire and tenderness, fraught with promise. A promise of tomorrow. Of peace and joy. A new start to their marriage.
They would begin their life together again, in passion and love this time, as true husband and wife.
Author’s Note
Dear Readers:
From the moment Jake McCord rode into my imagination, the outrageous rouge of an outlaw captured my heart. And so did his elder brother, maverick Sloan McCord, and their elusive half-Cheyenne friend, Wolf Logan.
The Heart Breaker Page 31
