His Wild West Wife

by Lauri Robinson

  He damned his reaction to her all over again.

  His shirt came next, and Blake could have groaned, may have, at the way her scent filled him. It was like walking past a flower garden—how she smelled—and he was as amazed by it now as much as he had been the first time he’d met her. He breathed deeply, lying perfectly still as she undid the buttons and slipped the shirt off his shoulders. Barely moving—on the outside that is—he offered little assistance as she eased his arms out of the sleeves.

  “We need to take these off, too,” she said, once the shirt was draped over a chair. Her hands had slipped beneath the sheet covering his hips, and he held his breath, hoped she wouldn’t notice how her nearness had his full attention. She was acting so aloof, he had to, too. He couldn’t let her know how badly he wanted to pull her close, kiss her until they were both breathless and clinging to each other as they had so many times in the past.

  That wasn’t why he was here, and therefore it wouldn’t happen. Still feigning to be overcome with pain, he wiggled slightly, aiding a small amount as she pulled his drawers off his hips, down his thighs, being extremely careful of the injured one. The gentleness of her touch was pure torture. Had every nerve humming and his pulse throbbing.

  “There.”

  She was standing beside him again, and he fought his entire length, willing not so much as a muscle to twitch.

  “Blake?” A hand, soft and tender, settled on his forehead, stayed there as he kept his breathing steady and his eyes closed. Her fingers combed into his hair, making him want to groan again as visions—no, memories—spun in his head. There’d been days, when they’d missed each other so much, they’d never made it as far as the bedroom when he got home. She’d met him at the door, whether it was noon or evening, and her eyes had sparked, telling him exactly what she’d wanted. He’d wanted the same thing. Their love had been so new and fresh they couldn’t get enough of each other.

  Blake’s throat thickened and he steadied himself. Love didn’t have anything to do with it. Not on her part. It was no longer within him, either. His restraint, however, was vanishing. One kiss wouldn’t matter. It might remind her of what she’d given up by running away.

  Grabbing her waist, and not caring an iota what the movement might do to his freshly doctored wounds, he lifted her off the floor and flipped her over him to land on the bed beside him.

  Shocked, surprised, stunned—he didn’t take the time to notice her expression. Instead he took her face between his palms and kissed her like he had on their wedding night.

  If she struggled, he didn’t notice, not with the way her lips parted, opening for him like the petals of a flower. The passion between them flared into life, like it always had, and overcame him instantly. It gave him satisfaction, too, how she responded.

  His lungs were on fire, needing air, but he didn’t stop, just drew in small snippets through his nose and went right on kissing her. Devouring her mouth and lips, and making her kiss him in return.

  She was the one to pull away, gasping for air. “You— Stop it.”

  “Why? We are still married.”

  As frustrated with himself as he was with her, he let her go and watched as she scrambled off the bed. The temperature of his blood dropped instantly, as if he’d just been overcome by a cold wind blowing off the lake in December.

  “You’re—you could have made your injuries worse,” she said, smoothing the material of her blue dress along the slender swell of her hips with shaking hands.

  “What difference would that make to you?”

  “They’ll never heal with that kind of behavior,” she said, walking around the foot of the bed, tugging the sheet to cover him once again.

  “Wounds heal, Clara,” he said coldly.

  “Not all wounds, Blake,” she answered without looking at him. “Some get infected.”

  Frustration zipped up his spine. “Yeah, they do,” he admitted. Those inside him had festered good and strong the past few months. “Why’d you leave like that?”

  Her glare was sharper than Mrs. Sinclair’s scissors. “I think you know.”

  “No I don’t,” he argued. “If I did—”

  “You what? Wouldn’t have done it?” She spun then, stomped to the door.

  “How do I know that if I don’t know what it was?” he shouted, but she was already slamming the door shut.

  Blake growled again, ran both hands through his hair and told himself—for the millionth time—it didn’t matter. In truth, this was better. A divorce. Marrying her had been a foolish, impulsive decision. Letting someone get that close could uncover secrets, ruin his reputation. Ruin his life.

  * * *

  Clara leaned against the door, shaken clear to her bones. Blake’s taste lingered on her lips and nothing would ever, could ever, taste as wonderful as he did. Or smell as good as he did, all fresh and wholesome, like the air after a rain. Nor feel like him...Just touching him she could feel his strength, the power he emitted. And she wanted him more than she ever had.

  His strength had been one of the first things she’d been drawn to. How dominant he was. How in control of his life. Something she’d never been. She’d wanted that, but she’d wanted him, too, all of him, in a deep and poignant way she hadn’t known existed.

  She still wanted him like that. What they had together was as rare as it was beautiful. It wasn’t just the act of lovemaking, though she desperately wanted that, too. When they were together her very soul emerged, broke out of the shell hidden inside her. She became whole. Real.

  “Is he all right?”

  Clara pushed off the door, fighting so many things, including how she’d responded to his injuries out in the field. Gunshots were nothing to mess with, but thankfully Auntie had done a tremendous job digging out each pellet. She just had to remember he was the one who’d betrayed her and was here now, not because he loved her, but to have her sign divorce papers.

  Swallowing against the sob in her throat, Clara nodded at her sister-in-law.

  “How about you?” Emily asked. “Are you all right?”

  All Clara could do was shake her head. She’d never be all right again. Not after seeing him again. Not after kissing him again.

  “Why didn’t you tell us you got married while in Chicago?” Emily whispered.

  The truth refused to be hidden. “Because it should never have happened.”

  “Why?”

  Disgust filled her. “Look at him. He’s a lawyer, and I’m a—” Her throat plugged.

  Emily’s sigh lingered in the air, made the weight inside Clara grow heavier.

  “William wants to talk to you,” her sister-in-law said, “but I’ll tell him you’re not up to it right now.”

  “No,” Clara answered, pushing the dead air out of her lungs. “There’s no sense putting it off.”

  “He just wants to understand what’s happened,” Emily said gently. “We all do.”

  Clara did, too. She’d been looking for answers for months. Years, maybe.

  “Clara, you—”

  Holding up a hand, Clara stopped Emily from saying anything more and left.

  * * *

  Her brother was in the barn, along with a teary-eyed Nathan. The pressure inside her needed be released, came out as anger. “You didn’t—”

  “Nathan’s punishment is none of your concern, Clara,” William said, taking her arm.

  She spun on one heel, had no choice with the way he tugged her
toward the door. “You’re his brother-in-law not his father,” she declared, still furious, still hurting.

  “I’m the only father he’ll ever know.” William led her into the sunshine. “And he knew he wasn’t to touch that gun. Any gun.”

  The heat of the sun only made her hotter, angrier. “Maybe it’s in his blood.”

  Tall, with broad shoulders and hair as yellow as the spring buttercups, William looked a lot like their father, and though her brother was as formidable as their parent had been, William never frightened her, and didn’t now, even as the red tint of his face said she’d annoyed him.

  “His father was an outlaw,” she reminded. “As was ours.”

  William continued to lead her across the front yard until they entered the shade of the loan elm near the corner of the whitewashed house. Her brother had made a lot of changes to the place over the years. The house now boasted two stories and a sprawling front porch. The barn had been rebuilt, too, and sheltered more than getaway ponies. It held milk and feed cows, chickens and pigs. There was a toolshed, too, that housed the plow that worked the fields now planted with corn, wheat and hay for the animals.

  “What happened today has nothing to do with who Nathan’s father was,” William said after a lengthy quiet.

  He and Emily were making something of themselves, no matter who their fathers had been. Clara had thought she could, too, at one time, but it hadn’t worked out that way.

  “And who our father was has nothing to do with that man lying in your bed,” her brother added.

  “Why’d you have to put him in my room?” she demanded, trying to keep other emotions from drowning out her anger. Blake had done a good job of covering up his pain, but she’d seen the sweat beading at his temples, the pinch of his lips, and that had spoken directly to her heart.

  “Because he’s your husband.”

  Clara kicked at the dirt, which did little to relieve the frustration gurgling inside her. She’d tried to forget that, forget Blake, but one look is all it had taken and she wanted him back. All of him. Which is why she’d left him, and now that he was here...

  Blake probably wanted her to sign those papers so he could marry that fancy woman at the rail station. That was fine. Better even. Let someone else deal with his infidelity.

  This time she growled as she kicked the dirt.

  “Feel better?” her brother asked.

  “No.”

  “Gonna tell me what really happened in Chicago?” William leaned one hand against the tree while glancing toward the house. “I knew when you came back there was more, I told you that.”

  He had, but hadn’t pushed her. Just welcomed her home. The frustration inside her softened. If not for her brother, she’d never have met Blake or her grandfather. Last fall, when William found a stack of letters that had been her mother’s in a wall he’d knocked down while remodeling the upstairs, he’d insisted upon writing to the man who’d sent them. Clara had held little hope of a response, but when one did arrive, it had been like a fairy tale, learning she had a grandfather, alive and living in Chicago. Her life had transformed the minute she’d boarded an eastbound train. She’d no longer been an outlaw’s daughter, but a wealthy man’s granddaughter. “It was nice, getting to know Oscar. I wished I’d known about him years ago.”

  “I wish you had, too, Clara,” William said sincerely. “I know how much you hated being Taylor Johnson’s daughter. If I’d known about your grandfather, I’d have sent you there years ago.”

  A wave of guilt rippled her skin. “I know you would’ve, and—”

  “What happened in Chicago, Clara?” William interrupted softly.

  Her guilt grew. William was more than her half brother. He’d been the one to tell their father they weren’t moving again, that they’d live with Auntie. He’d only been eight then, she’d been three and her mother had just died. Auntie had told her about it. Clara never gave him credit for that or all the other things he’d done for her. Instead, for as long as she could remember, she’d dreamed of leaving Kansas, severing all connections to Taylor Johnson and the gang of outlaws that rode with him, even after their arrests.

  Taylor and four others were serving time down in Yuma—life sentences—and the other two, including Emily’s father, had died in the shoot-out not ten miles from here.

  If Taylor ever got out, he’d come looking for her. Clara knew that. She’d been the one who tipped off the law seven years ago about the train the gang had robbed. At thirteen she’d become fed up with the late night visits, patching up bullet holes, of how William and Auntie insisted she stay out of sight as much as possible. When a man wearing a badge stopped by after one such visit, questioning the whereabouts of Taylor, Clara told him everything she’d overheard while hiding in the barn. She’d do it again, too. No one should have to live like they had. She’d seen—experienced—the other side of life while living in Chicago. It had been all she’d ever dreamed of—more so once she’d met Blake.

  A chill went so deep her bones shivered despite the hot midday sun. “Maybe it’s my payback,” she muttered.

  “What?”

  Clara didn’t have time to answer, Charlotte yelled out the front door right then. “Clara, come quick! Your husband’s trying to get out of bed!”

  Chapter Three

  If Blake had his way he’d have the old woman cut his leg off with her scissors. The crazy thing wouldn’t hold any weight, which is how he came to be sitting on the floor, his pants half on and the sheet off the bed covering his privates, with a roomful of women staring at him. Well, some were girls. Little ones.

  Clara arrived then, took one look at him and started chasing out the entire lot.

  “What were you thinking?” she asked, closing the door.

  He kept his eyes on the door, making sure it stayed shut. “How many people live in this house?”

  She leaned down, caught him under one arm. “Come on, I’ll help you up.”

  Blake shook his head, not ready to move yet, the leg still stung like a swarm of bees were attacking it. “How many people live in this house?” he asked again.

  Clara stepped back, began gathering the other blankets piled on the floor. “You’ve already met my brother, William. He’s married to Emily. The twin girls, Maize and Marie, who just turned three, are their daughters, and Charlotte, she’s twelve, and Nathan, are Emily’s brother and sister. And then there’s Auntie. Mrs. Sinclair. She’s William’s aunt, but we all call her Auntie.”

  As the names settled in his mind, he asked, “If she’s William’s aunt, wouldn’t she be yours, too?”

  “No. She’s William’s mother’s aunt, his great-aunt. He and I had different mothers. Just the same father.”

  The melancholy of her tone stabbed him. She’d never wanted to talk about her family, and he doubted that had changed. He didn’t like talking about his, either, never had. The only time he’d regretted that, outside of now, was when she’d left and other than a few small references to Kansas he’d had no idea where to start looking for her. “Why do Charlotte and Nathan live here, with their sister?” he asked. The lawyer in him had kicked in, telling him there was much more to her past than he’d ever imagined.

  “Their mother died giving birth to Nathan and Auntie insisted they move in here with us.” Quiet for a moment, she then added, “Their father died the next year and William and Emily got married a couple of years later.”

  “William’s farming supports all of y
ou?”

  Her chin took on a stubborn set. “Yes.”

  The questions were flying into his mind like a flock of seagulls following a ship into the bay, and a single thought stuck like glue. “You never planned on staying in Chicago, did you?”

  When she didn’t answer, just stood there, not meeting his gaze, he added, “You only went there to get Oscar’s money.”

  Her face and neck turned bright red. “That’s not true.”

  He highly doubted that. It had been a considerable amount, what she’d inherited upon the man’s death, yet the farm didn’t show it. Not from what he could see. It was clear she wasn’t going to elaborate, and though a dozen more questions wanted out, sitting on the floor as he was, didn’t give him the same power to demand answers as standing did, so he held his silence. Let the fact their marriage had simply been a way for her to pass time rankle deeper inside him.

  “How’s your leg?” she asked, breaking a long span of silence.

  “Fine.”

  She twisted, glanced at him with those blue eyes and cocked a brow.

  It was true. There was hardly any pain in his leg. She did that to him. That tiny kiss-me smile she was attempting to disguise eased his pain more than the whole bottle of Mrs. Sinclair’s foul whiskey could ever do. He’d expected to fight her, but this battling within himself was taxing his common sense.

  She stepped forward. “I’ll help you into bed.”

  “No,” he said.

  “You’re just going to sit there?”

  Several other things came to mind, which would include stripping her down as naked as he was. She’d respond to him, he had no doubt. It was in her eyes, as always. That was part of the reason he’d been taken by surprise that night, when he’d arrived home to an empty house. There’d been no forewarning. No argument or misunderstanding.