To think she was receiving such pleasure in performing an act she'd always considered revolting, an act she'd thought to be the ultimate form of degradation demanded by a man from a woman. Katlin suddenly realized there was indeed a difference between having sex and making love. Love being the operative word.
When Mitch felt he was about to explode, he tightened his hold on her hair and pulled her away from him. Taking her by the shoulders, he pushed her back onto the blanket and followed her down.
As they'd done the first time, their lovemaking matched the tempo of the elements. This time slow and gentle, like the pitty-pat of raindrops against a window. They took the time to explore and learn each other's body with caressing hands and exploring lips. Yet despite the slower, gentler pace, when they took the orgasmic free fall through time and space together, it was no less exciting and soul-gripping than the one before it.
When their heart rates stabilized and their ragged breathing returned to normal, Mitch rolled off Katlin onto his back, pulling her onto her side so she rested against him with his arm around her and her head resting on his shoulder.
While they laid quietly wrapped in each other's arms, watching the light show still playing itself out in the clouds above them, Katlin had only one regret. She was keeping something important from Mitch, and it was there between them like an invisible barrier she could no longer tolerate.
Katlin couldn't think of a worse time for it, while they were savoring the afterglow of their lovemaking, but, there might not be a more opportune time either. Like it or not, there were some unpleasant realities out there they had to face. They needed to be prepared for the time when reality caught up with them.
"Mitch," Katlin began hesitantly, "we need to talk."
"I know," he responded. "I was just hoping we could keep the world out a little longer."
"Yeah, me too," Katlin agreed. "I’m sorry, Mitch, but there are things you need to know. I should have told you as soon as I suspected what was going on, but I hoped I was wrong."
Mitch rolled to his side, leaned up on one elbow, and looked down at her. "Kat, you don't have anything to be sorry for," he insisted. "None of what is happening here is your fault." He reached out and traced her bottom lip with the pad of his thumb. It was slightly swollen from his kisses. Unable to resist, he leaned down and kissed her gently. "What ever it is, we'll handle it together."
"I hope you mean that."
"Trust me, Kat."
If he only knew what it was like growing up struggling to earn her father's love and acceptance and being forced to hide the pain of his rejection so no one would know how much she was hurting. She'd learned at such a painfully early age never to have expectations regarding someone else's actions, thus setting herself up for disappointment and heartache.
From the very beginning, Mitch had accepted her for who she was, what she was. It was without a doubt a situation which would have sent lesser men running for the hills with their tails between their legs. Considering everything she'd put him through, he'd stood by her all the way and he'd fallen in love with her just as she had with him. Still, that old fear of rejection kept rearing its ugly head, refusing to be cast out no matter how hard she tried to let it go.
"I love you," Katlin told him, feeling the words with all her heart, and then she began to talk.
Sarah lay in bed in her dark bedroom, all senses tense and alert as she listened, dreading the sound of the squeak from the step at the top of the stairs that would signal Rick's approach. "s if sensing her tension, the baby inside her rolled and kicked. Sarah lifted her hand to her stomach and gently rubbed at the tight knot on her right side where the baby appeared to be laying.
"It'll be all right, little one," she crooned softly. "When you come into this world, your home will be filled with laughter, love, and happiness. I promise you." " Soon, it will all be over, soon," she repeated over and over again to herself like a comforting mantra, praying that if she said it often enough she could make it happen.
The step first from the top of the stairs squeaked.
Sarah rolled onto her side as close to the edge of the bed as she could get without falling out and closed her eyes, pretending to be asleep. Concentrating on her breathing, hoping it would appear even and steady, she waited for her husband to enter the room. Maybe, just maybe, if she was lucky, the performance she and Katlin put on had made a difference.
Rick stumbled into the room and deliberately slammed the door closed behind him. Sarah heard him fumble with the oil lamp beside the bed, and then light filled the room.
"I know you're not asleep, Sarah. And if you are, that's too damn bad." His words were slurred, and still Sarah kept her eyes closed even though she knew the effort was wasted.
His boots hit the floor with a clatter as he removed them. Her senses were so alert to his every movement she could hear each piece of clothing hit the floor. Even the sound of his bare feet against the wooden floor boards sounded unnaturally loud as he made his way around to her side of the bed. The coil of apprehension within her winding tighter with every step he took.
"Open your eyes and look at me, wife," Rick demanded in a tone of voice Sarah knew only too well. Knowing it would go harder on her if she didn't do as she was told, she opened her eyes.
Rick was standing over her stroking himself to a rigid erection. Despite the fact that her love for her husband had turned into hate, Sarah still recognized that Rick was an incredibly handsome man, a fact he was well aware of and used to his advantage. He leaned down, wrapped her thick braid around his hand, and pulled her to a sitting position, her legs over the side of the bed.
"My friend here needs some attention," he insisted.
"Don't lose control, Sarah," she told herself firmly and began taking deep breaths to calm herself down. What she wanted to do was to leap from the bed and rip into him with all the pent up anger inside her. But she couldn't do that. "t this point, she wouldn't do anything that might provoke him to anger and put her baby at risk. "Do what you have to do, and it will be over soon." The baby was still the one thing in her favor. Maybe he wasn't so drunk that he'd take the chance of harming the baby.
"Please, Rick, I really don't feel well. I don't want us to do something that might cause the baby to come early," she pleaded.
"I have no intention of doing anything to hurt my baby," he snapped. "There's more than one way of taking care of my problem, or have you forgotten?"
Sarah's stomach began to churn, and she began taking deep breaths in an attempt to ward off the nausea.
"You’re breathing heavy. "re you getting hot, Sarah? I always figured you liked it but were too damn prissy to admit it." Still using her braid for control, he pulled her to her feet. "Take off your gown."
Hand trembling so badly she had difficulty releasing the buttons at the top of her full length cotton nightgown, Sarah complied wordlessly. Inside she was screaming in rebellion. Since she'd gotten pregnant, he'd rarely touched her, and he'd never seen her nude since then. On those rare occasions, he'd merely pushed her gown up, forced himself inside her, got himself off, then rolled over and went to sleep.
"Well, I'll be damned," Rick muttered as his eyes slid over his wife's naked, very pregnant body. "Can't say as I've ever played with a pregnant woman before. This just might be fun."
Reaching out with both hands, he ran them over her swollen abdomen, occasionally pausing when he felt the baby move beneath a caressing palm. "I did this to you. I planted my seed in you, and now my son is growing inside your belly." His eyes met her's, and his lips curved into a smile devoid of warmth or affection. "I own you. I can do anything I want to you, and there isn't a soul who would lift a finger to stop me."
Sarah had heard that particular claim so many times she'd begun to accept it as fact, her soul slowly dying inch by inch at the prospect of the existence she had to look forward to. Now, thank God, after talking to Katlin, Sarah realized she'd given up too easily. There was someone out there determined to
stop Rick. And if Katlin failed, Sarah knew she'd somehow find the strength to take matters into her own hands. She'd kill him herself and damn the consequences.
Rick's hands moved up to her painfully swollen, ultra sensitive breasts. "t first, he was almost gentle as he kneaded her, teasing her nipples to rock hardness with his thumbs. Against her will, a soft moan escaped her.
"Your tits have gotten so big and hard. I didn't know what I was missing," he chuckled. Taking her nipples between his thumbs and forefingers, he began rolling them between his fingers occasionally tugging until he forced a whimper of pain from her. Sarah felt fluid excrete from her nipples, her knees buckled, and she'd have fallen if his grip on her breasts hadn't held her up.
Releasing her abruptly, he allowed her to sink down onto the side of the bed. Rick rubbed his thumb and forefinger together testing the consistency of the fluid then brought his hand to his mouth and licked his finger with the tip of his tongue.
Breasts hot, heavy, and painfully swollen with milk. Oh yes! What an erotic turn on. Just imagining the things he could do sent his erection to throbbing. He'd have her begging for mercy. But not now. He'd wait until after the baby was born, when her milk was in, and he wouldn't risk harming his son with his games.
Besides, he had much more erotic pleasures on his mind. Pleasures that didn't include his dowdy spiritless wife. What he wanted and intended to have was a spirited, red-headed female with cold, calculating eyes. " woman who would put up a fight, and, before he was finished with her, he'd see fire in those eyes. She'd be begging him to take her.
Just thinking of her set him on fire. He moved between his wife's thighs. "gain, using his favorite form of leverage, he wrapped her braid around his fist and forced her head down toward his throbbing erection.
"You know what I want. Make it good, or you'll regret it," he demanded.
Sarah's stomach rebelled and churned, and she resisted. He reached down, grasped one of her breasts, and squeezed until she gasped with pain. He thrust forward between his wife's lips, sliding in as deep as he could go.
"s Rick looked down, watching his wife pleasure him, it wasn't dark hair he saw wrapped around the fist he used to control her movements, it was a shining, glorious red. It wasn't his wife's lips he imagined wrapped around him. The lips belonged to Katlin McKinnen.
Tears of humiliation and deep-seated rage flowed freely from Sarah's eyes as she kept repeating her mantra inside her head.
"Soon. It will be over, soon."
Without attempting to gloss over a single detail, Katlin told Mitch everything she knew about the Westfield family, including the threats she'd received from that quarter. She even explained what young Jenny Logan had suffered at Rick's hands, and she'd concluded with her suspicions regarding his father's murder the motive behind it and the subsequent bounty on Mitch's head.
To his credit, he quietly listened to every word without a single question or interruption. He was in fact so quiet Katlin was beginning to feel uneasy.
"Say something, Mitch," Katlin urged softly.
Mitch detected a note of anxiety in her voice. Regretting that his silence had put it there, he again rolled to his side, leaned up on his elbow, and looked down at her. He met the uncertainty in her eyes, smiled that killer smile of his that never failed to turn her insides to mush, and Katlin knew what he was going to say before the words left his lips.
"I love you."
"You do realize the reason I'm here is to stop Rick and his father?"
"I realize that . . . and I thank God for it."
Clearly confused by his reaction to the news she'd just handed him, Katlin jack-knifed into a sitting position and looked down at him. "Damn it, Mitch, aren't you surprised or upset by any of this?"
Understanding her confusion, Mitch attempted to explain what really made no sense at all. "I know I should feel upset and angry, but, at this exact moment, I feel so totally content that I can't summon the energy for a negative emotion toward anything. I should be surprised by their actions, but I'm not. Hell, sweetheart, since meeting you, I'm not sure anything will surprise me ever again." He reached up, cupped his hand to the side of her neck, and began tracing her jaw line with his thumb. "Most important is the realization that if you hadn't been sent here to stop the Westfield's rein of corruption before it goes any further, we'd never have found each other. "t worst, I'd now be a dead man. "t best, I'd still be leading a solitary existence, not letting anyone get too close, and telling myself I wanted it that way. Instead, all I can think of when I look up at you is that I must be the luckiest man alive."
Katlin's heart constricted painfully in her chest, tears began to flow, and she had to swallow a lump in her throat before she could speak, "I love you so much."
"Then come back down here beside me where you belong." Sliding his hand around to the nape of her neck, he exerted gentle pressure and pulled her down beside him into his arms.
Katlin felt she had to ask, "What are we going to do about Rick and his father?"
"We’re going to do what we have to do. We're going to bring them down. But not tonight and not tomorrow. Tomorrow you become my wife. The day belongs to us."
"They'll be there you know, at the wedding," she reminded him. "We can't let them know we're on to them until we have evidence to back us up."
"Kat, it won't matter who is or who isn't in that church. I won't see anyone but you." She opened her mouth to speak, and he silenced her with a kiss that wiped out what she'd been about to say.
Mitch broke the kiss before things became heated, again. Katlin snuggled against him with a sigh that reminded Mitch of a purr from a contented kitten. Correct that. "s her hand began toying with the hair on his chest, Mitch amended the comparison to a rather frisky kitten. Here he'd been determined to be thoughtful and considerate, letting her get some sleep. He knew she had to be exhausted, not to mention sore. And here she was hell bent on shooting his good intentions to hell as her marauding hand began moving downward until she held his erection in her hot little palm.
"Um, Mitch?"
"Um, hum," he responded through clinched teeth.
"I admit to being inexperienced, so correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't this thing supposed to go down?"
"That’s the way it's supposed to work, but I'm beginning to think its become a permanent condition."
"Not that I have any objections to that prospect, but I'd think you'd be getting a little uncomfortable by now."
"No shit," Mitch muttered.
Katlin chuckled and began stroking him. "So, what do you suggest we do to relieve your, um, problem?"
"Damn it, Kat, behave. You're playing hell with my noble intentions."
"Noble Intentions? Interesting name for it," she teased. "Actually, Ranger Cameron, I think you need to stuff your Noble Intentions . . . where it belongs."
It took a second for the exact meaning behind Katlin's words to sink in, and then Mitch began laughing. "You're not going to thank me tomorrow while you're riding into town astride a hard saddle."
Katlin joined him laughing and moved on top of him. "Probably not, but I'll certainly remember how I got in that uncomfortable condition."
The tough as nails lady cop, dubbed the Ice Princess, and the loner, Texas Ranger known to be hard, cold, and relentless in his pursuit of a criminal, rolled and tumbled each other on the blankets. They teased, they laughed, and they loved.
The clouds parted, stars began to dot the night sky, and the light of the moon shined down upon the lovers.
Chapter Thirteen
Returning to Abilene the next morning, Mitch and Katlin were surprised to find the vicious storm from which they'd been forced to take shelter had bypassed the town, dropping only enough rain to settle the dust and freshen the air. It wasn't an uncommon occurrence. She had seen instances where one side of town would receive a downpour and the other side not so much as a drop. Nevertheless, Katlin suspected that with the urging of an unpredictable spirit guide, Mother Nature h
ad created a situation to prod human nature in the right direction.
Like an overzealous guardian who had spent the night walking the floor, constantly checking out the window all night for the return of his charge, Ben came charging out of the batwing doors before they came to a complete halt and glared angrily at Mitch before looking up at Katlin. ""re you all right, Katie?"
"I couldn't be better," Katlin responded brightly, and then shocked herself and the two men watching her as her eyes misted with tears. The image of another Ben Thompson and another incident flashed through her mind. She'd just turned sixteen and had arranged for her date to pick her up and return her to aunt and uncle's home. Her first date, with the high school heart throb and football hero no less. " good looking jock who seemed to take it as his personal responsibility to hold the school record for scoring touchdowns both on the field and off. She'd been so naive she had actually believed him when he told her he wanted to drive out in the country so they could sit and talk and get to know each other better. He'd ended up with a broken nose, a sprained wrist, and a bruised ego. She'd been forced to walk several miles back to town, arriving on Uncle Ben's front porch two hours past the time she promised to return. Katlin hadn't gone beyond the first step before a frantic Ben shot out the door, ready to take apart her date with his bare hands. Her Uncle had spent those two hours pacing the floor, imagining all the horrible things which could befall an innocent young girl. On that night so long ago, Katlin had returned with her virtue safely intact. She couldn't say the same thing this time.
Looking down at this Ben Thompson, seeing the same frantic concern in his dark eyes, her heart clenched, and she was instantly contrite. She suspected his fears weren't so much for her virtue but for her life. He had been afraid the Westfields would consider having her and Mitch at the ranch together was a good opportunity to get rid of them both.
"I'm sorry we worried you, Ben," Katlin apologized, fighting back the tears threatening to fall. How had being so happy turned her into such an emotional wimp? "We got caught in the storm and had to take shelter."
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