by Twilight
He moved behind her, so close he could hear her breathing, feel her heat, fill his lungs with her womanly smell. He drank in the sight of her. She swayed slightly, that willow in the wind, and his arm slipped about her waist, catching her. The stool crashed into the wall with one vicious swing of his booted foot, dissolving the last of the barriers.
His chest met with the sweep of her back, and he flexed his arm, lifting the lush roundness of her buttocks against his pelvis and burying his face in the curve where her shoulder met with her neck.
“Please...” The word rasped like a plea from a dying man. And he was dying, in that lonely, lost part of his soul that had finally found solace with someone...this woman. She wasn’t simply that which would stoke and sate his lust. He wanted to lose himself within her, find all that he’d never thought to find...
What the hell had she done to him?
Her pulse beat rapidly against his palm as it moved over the curve of her belly. He shared her breath when her head arced closer to his. She tasted of dew, of sweet summer rain and windblown meadows, along her neck, where the skin bore several tiny blisters from the spattering stew. He pressed his lips there, and she quivered against him, his dove, but it was he who was held, trembling in her hand. It was she who wielded all power.
“Stark—” Her hand covered his when his thumb hooked in the strap of her camisole and slid it slowly from her shoulder.
“Jess...sweet, beautiful Jess...let me take you to heaven.”
“No—” she whispered hoarsely, her eyes fluttering closed when his mouth moved over her bare shoulder. “You wish to rob me of my will.”
“I’m not going to take anything from you,” he murmured. “I want to give you pleasure. I want...so much, and I don’t understand any of it. Fire me if you want, but let me, Jess...let me...”
He felt the trembling of her, the uncertainty, heard the clamoring of his conscience...and still he wanted more. All of her, the sweet creaminess of her breasts swelling above her camisole, the promise of all the joy he would find within her arms, deep inside her. And then, above the rush of the blood in his ears, he heard the slam of the back door.
“Mama, I found my slate!”
Rance’s eyes met with hers in the glass, and he saw so very much in that one moment... A fleeting regret? Or simply the imaginings of a lust-crazed male animal, yet again to be denied?
And then she looked positively stricken, all blood draining from her face. In one sweep of his arms, he lifted her and carried her to the bed.
And she commenced with a sputtering and squirming entirely unsuitable for her circumstances. “Good heavens, surely you don’t mean to...to...on my bed...right now... Stark!”
“Don’t think the idea hasn’t crossed my mind, at least once today,” he muttered, yanking back the coverlet and depositing her and all her flailing limbs on the bed.
“Mama! Where are you, Mama?”
“She’s in here,” Stark called out, much to Jessica’s obvious horror.
She blinked up at him with mouth agape. “B-but, I— H-he cannot possibly see me in this bed, and y-you here in m-my—”
“Lie down,” he ordered, firmly shoving her back on the pillows. He leaned close over her and brushed his thumb over her full lower lip. “And shut up.”
“I most certainly will not!” she sputtered, legs thrashing at the coverlet, fists shoving at his shoulders as she struggled to get up. “You might find having your way with me rather like a stroll in the park, but as for my son—”
“Mama?”
Christian suddenly appeared in the doorway, slate in hand. A curious look passed over his features as he stared first at Rance, then at his mother. Rance wondered if guilt emblazoned itself upon his face. Guilt, hell, that was the least of it. To her credit, Jessica clutched a hand to her bodice and collapsed against the pillows.
Rance swiftly drew the coverlet clear to her chin. “Your mama’s not feeling well, Christian,” he said.
“She looks fine to me,” Christian replied, with a decidedly dubious look. He moved to the bedside and frowned at his mother. “You’re never sick, Mama. She’s never sick, Logan. And you’re mussing up your bed, Mama. It’s not nighttime yet. You’re not supposed to muss up your made bed, right, Logan?”
“I think she wants us to leave,” Rance said, well aware of the sparks flashing in her blue eyes.
“How come she’s not wearing her nightclothes? She’s supposed to be wearing nightclothes, not that girlie stuff. Were you helpin’ her get undressed, Logan?”
“Thank you, Christian,” Jessica quickly said. “I shall find my nightclothes.”
“Is Logan gonna help you?”
“I think your mama would prefer to be alone for just a while.”
“But not for too long,” Christian said. “She has to make us dinner. She might forget.”
“She would never forget,” Rance replied, urging the boy from the room with the slight pressure of his hand at his back.
“This means I don’t have to practice my numbers, right, Logan? Right?”
“Practice your numbers and then you can help me build my fence and exercise Jack.”
“Oh, boy!” Christian shouted, dashing for the back door. “I want to learn to ride him. Can’t I? Are you coming, Logan?”
Rance paused just outside Jessica’s bedroom, unable to keep his eyes from drifting back to her. She sat in a slanting ray of sunlight, with the coverlet clutched to her breasts, eyes wide and shining amid a wild tumble of blond curls. For all her prior sputtering and thrashing, she now looked terrified. Of him...or herself? An ache like nothing he’d ever known burgeoned low and deep in his gut and spread through his limbs, into his chest, to tighten like a fist around his heart.
Had Christian not barged into the house when he had, Rance knew, he’d have taken her there on that virginal white coverlet, perhaps against her dressing table, on her hooked rug, without guilt or conscience or remorse. Driven by this lust, this...this...need. Why, dammit? Why her? Why not ride to the nearest saloon and find his surcease with some faceless woman?
And then he knew, simply looking at her he knew, why the thought of another woman hadn’t even entered his mind, why the thought of those to come suddenly seemed beyond him...why he’d rather remain here and torture himself with the prospect of some sort of self-imposed celibacy for the sake of righting his wrongs.
Jessica Wynne needed a man to make incessant, impassioned love to her far more than she needed a barn repaired or a fence built or all those plants irrigated. She ached with it, craved it, every sinuous movement of her body screamed with it, even if she didn’t yet know it for what it was. It was in her eyes whenever she looked at him, all her pious notions be damned. A woman’s passion, newly stoked, too potent to be denied. He wondered how long she could withstand it. And what man who was only mortal could resist such a temptation? A man who had everything to lose, perhaps. A man who, by giving in to such temptation, would practice the greatest deceit yet upon this woman, and possibly commit his most grievous injustice, one he could never undo.
It was with this grim realization that Rance closed the bedroom door and turned to seek the blistering sun and all that stone once more. An inconsequential penance to pay, considering what he had come so very close to doing.
* * *
Jessica had long ago learned the wisdom of heeding instinct, particularly where it concerned her son. And this niggling at the back of her head was not some bothersome fly or the effects of too much sun. It was instinct telling her in no uncertain terms that far too long a time had passed in utter peace and quiet.
Wiping the back of one dirt-smudged hand over her brow, she sat back upon her heels and surveyed the lively row of newly planted pink and red geraniums lining her reconstructed stone fence. Yes, there was no denying the man had done a magnificent job, far better than she’d envisioned, to be perfectly honest. He’d since directed himself with equal diligence to the woefully bowed side of the barn, achieving
remarkable results in only several days, and with surprisingly few funds. Indeed, he had yet to come to her for additional money for lumber, paint and the like, despite the four return trips he’d made to Twilight for more supplies. He had a stack of lumber sitting in the barn that reached nearly to her chest, cans of paint, tools...all purchased with the coins in that one straw purse.
This caused her a moment’s pause. Avram’s estimates for refurbishing the farm had always far exceeded the money she’d managed to scrimp together for that purpose, all of which she had given Stark over a week prior. Of course, Avram had admitted with a certain visible pride to never having had to build a thing in his life. The callings of his congregation required little in the way of building expertise, after all. Still, as was his wont, he’d professed himself possessed of the knowledge to do so, if need be, and promptly declared financing such a project well beyond her means. Either Stark was a wizard in disguise, capable of squeezing all the money he wished from very little coin—possible, given his myriad abilities, but highly unlikely—or Avram had purposely inflated his estimates, the quicker to convince her to sell her farm. Her teeth slid together, and she shoved her spade deep into the soil. One could view his actions as bordering on the dishonest and self-serving, if one were naturally inclined to think such things. Which she’d truly never been. Until now, blast it.
Indeed, Avram had seized upon any sort of visible progress with the fence and the barn not as a means of displaying a newfound support of her quest, but rather as the ideal opportunity to commence with a recitation of the boundless reasons for her to regain both her faculties and her senses and sell. As though any progress whatsoever merely strengthened both his argument and his resolve! How, pray, was the barn going to keep itself painted and upright, the house from crumbling to the ground, once they married and Stark rode his black beast back to wherever it was he came from? Perhaps Stark need not leave so soon....
Whence this ridiculous notion had sprung, Jessica hadn’t the faintest idea—and for it to leap as it had from her tongue! Avram, of course, had gaped at her and then stomped about, blustering and barking about her duty as his wife to obey him, to heed his wishes, what he believed was best for her and her son. Never once had she detected the slightest hint of jealousy in his voice. Not that she’d been particularly attuned for it, mind you, but he hadn’t even mentioned Stark or made any hint of a brutal reference to his habit of stalking about sans anything but those low-riding, thigh-hugging, faded denims. No, Avram’s male animal was not challenged in any way. Odd. Then again, perhaps she had succeeded in fooling at least Avram...though certainly not herself any longer. As for Stark...
She’d barely seen him since their disturbing interlude in her bedroom four days past. He was inordinately busy, of course, as was she. He worked from sunup to sundown, and beyond, well into the night, barely pausing to take a meal that he’d requested be brought outside to him. He had yet to return to that chair at her kitchen table. He had yet to speak more than a few words to her, all insignificant exchanges of a sort more common to employers and employees, not lovers.
Oh, but to realize one possessed the soul of a heathen. Perhaps he was some sort of wizard. Yes, indeed, he must be. He’d cast some sort of ridiculous spell on her. Surely that would absolve her of this...this...unconscionable need to simply find herself sharing the same room with him, to envelop herself in his scent, to look into those whiskey eyes, and, worst of all, to relive again and again the feel of those callused hands and the undeniably swollen maleness of his pelvis rocking against her buttocks.
She jerked to her feet and lifted her face into the dust-blowing onslaught that was the hot afternoon wind. Anything to redirect her thoughts, though it was rather strange, while she still mused on Stark, that she hadn’t heard any pounding or sawing coming from the barn for quite some time. Just the lonely howl of the wind and the creak of the windmill. And no sign of Christian, either.
Instinct, getting itself all entangled with a hedonist’s immoral yearnings. What sort of woman—worse yet, a woman engaged to another—allowed herself such weakness? This could not be tolerated. Yet how did one contrive to vanquish such an inclination and at the same time keep all signs of it from one’s face, particularly where one’s fiancé was concerned? She could, of course, relieve Stark of his post and thus remove him from her life. That, logical as it might be, was out of the question at the moment. After all, things were going rather swimmingly...with regard to the barn, that is. No, her father had been one to face his obstacles and gain the upper hand. And so would she, blast it, no matter that when faced with that obstacle she’d rather throw herself into his arms than deny herself that pleasure.
The barn was empty, strangely quiet. Ah, his horse was gone, as was the buckboard. Funny. He’d made no mention of journeying to Twilight, and had he, the buckboard would have had to pass directly by her while she planted all those geraniums. They must have gone off in the opposite direction. But where? And was Christian with him, as usual?
She found herself following the wheel tracks west, through scorched brush, wishing she’d paused for a dipper of water from the well. Here, without the house or the barn for protection, Mother Nature was most brutal. The air, dust-choked and stifling...the sun, raining heat like some fiery tempest...the earth, scorched raw and uneven, so that her ankles twisted in the innumerable ruts. The wind whipped relentlessly at her skirts, hopelessly tangling them between her legs and laying complete ruin to her hair. Through the tangles, she spied in the distance, somewhere beyond the billowing waves of gold heat, the willows growing thicker, taller, along the banks of a narrow stream.
Her chest compressed as if beneath a crushing blow. The stream...deep enough for a child to drown in, especially a child who’d never learned to swim, one afraid to even put his head near the water. Jessica had attempted on several occasions to teach her son to swim, if only for her own peace of mind, but to no avail. Christian had balked and howled and stoutly refused. She had, therefore, forbidden him to venture anywhere near water, particularly the stream.
Stark had no way of knowing this. Would Christian, eager to impress his idol, foolishly plunge into that water and to certain death?
She clutched at her skirts and ran blindly toward that growth of willows. No...they weren’t there...they’d gone beyond...somewhere...to catch a rabbit or squirrel...to even shoot that blasted gun...anything, not the stream...
Yet why would Stark venture out here in this heat, if not to seek respite?
Her lungs collapsed of all air. Tiny lights flashed before her eyes. She should have told Stark, should have foreseen this...but no, he should have known not to take a young child in water, no matter the unbearable heat of the day. Tears blurred her vision. He should have known...he was to blame...and yet some part of her clung to the conviction that her son was safe with Stark, that from the moment he set foot on her farm, he’d protected Christian.
And then she saw it...the buckboard looming just ahead, in a tall growth of willows, and beyond, the sparkling waters of the stream.
She ran to the wagon, a cry choking her when she found it empty. Her fingers clutched at the curved ironwork, one palm smoothing the seat where Christian had perched that morning a week prior in nothing but his nightclothes. And then she heard it. The splash. And another. And something that sounded like a whoop of terror.
She whirled about and plunged through the brush, toward the sounds. Branches tore at her hair, her dress, drew blood from her face, and the sun beat with merciless zest upon her. Hell would feel much like this, replete with the horror of the unknown.
She shoved the last of the brush aside and froze. There upon the grassy bank, Stark and her son stood, side by side, very much alive, very wet, and entirely naked. Jessica blinked. And gulped and felt every last drop of blood drain from her limbs in a torrent of relief, and something more.
They’d joined hands, and they seemed poised there, just moments from plunging into the water, as if in open defia
nce of Mother Nature and the blistery heat. Indeed, they’d defied her. Here the sunlight danced about them, its touch softly muted, as though applied with a loving hand. Droplets glistened upon their backs and shoulders, Stark’s so broad, so bronzed and sleekly sculpted, Jessica felt her mouth water. She watched a trickle weave down his back to the impossible narrowness of his waist, and beyond, to the muscled high plains of his buttocks. He shifted his weight, and those muscles flexed. Jessica clutched at brush to keep herself upright.
His legs seemed miles long, magnificently made, undeniably strong. He was, without question, the most beautiful thing Jessica had ever seen...or could imagine. And she stared with unabashed admiration, entirely without guilt.
Christian let out a tremendous whoop, and they plunged as one into the water, submerging for what seemed a lifetime, then surfacing in one huge sputtering, giggling mass. Stark hoisted Christian entirely from the water, held him with one arm over his head, then tossed him skyward, caught him and again submerged with the boy in his arms. They surfaced, and Christian dissolved into a bundle of guttural giggles. Jessica had never heard him laugh like that. It was the kind that starts deep in the belly and bubbles forth in all its unfettered glee. And Stark...
With head thrown back, he bellowed and hooted at the sky. Staring at his exposed throat, listening to all that unrestrained passion and bravado in his voice, Jessica felt a yearning so deep she nearly cried out with the agony of it. Oh, but a heathen’s thoughts were torturous, indeed. To ache so desperately to be the one nestled in those arms, to be wet and frolicking with him and her son in that water, to abandon all reservations, along with her clothes, upon some grassy bank... This was what she had yearned for. This was the unknown, the mystery, that part of her that had yet gone unfulfilled. So long she had denied this disturbing emptiness in her, both with Frank and now with Avram, believing the lack her own, somehow. And yet how could she have known such wondrous passion could be stoked by a man even in an existence such as hers? Somehow, somewhere, she’d come upon the notion that one required beautiful couture gowns, a magnificent home, society standing and a posh New England setting to experience such things. This sort of thing didn’t happen to nervous little widows in gray muslin gowns, women consumed with responsibility and toil, here, upon a lonely, unforgiving, sun-baked prairie.
