Promises Keep (The Promise Series)

by Sarah McCarty

  “Thank you.”

  She sounded entirely too relieved for Cougar’s peace of mind. “She won’t be tiring of anything.”

  He knew Brad wouldn’t let the challenge pass. He took a drag, let the smoke soothe his rough edges and waited out the response.

  “So you say but we all know your inflated opinion of your prowess.”

  “This from a man of God?” Smoke drifted with his question. “I could be grass-green and still have more to boast about than you.”

  Brad laughed, slapped him on the back, damned near knocking his smoke from his lips, and headed for the door. His hand was on the knob before he made his parting shot, “Unlike the Catholics, celibacy isn’t a vow I’m forced to make.”

  “More’s the pity,” Cougar muttered as the door closed behind him. He took another drag, and turning, saw his wife sitting up in bed, blushing prettily. It took him a minute to figure out the source of that blush.

  They were in a bedroom. She was his wife, and this was their wedding day. To make things even better, as Doc and Dorothy would be attending Dillon’s funeral, they were alone with the whole day stretching before them—a big void crying out to be filled. He smiled around his cigarette. He could probably come up with a few things to do.

  * * * * *

  If anyone had told Mara she’d be spending her wedding day playing chess, she would have laughed in their face. She’d had plans for her wedding, big plans all of which involved a formal ceremony, a formal dress, and formal party afterwards. Everyone would be dressed up in their best clothes, properly polite and the closest she would have come to frivolity would have been tossing her bouquet. She would not have had nearly the fun she’d had today.

  Who knew chess could be such an amusing battle of wits as well as intelligence? She hesitated, her fingers brushing the smooth wooden head of the exquisitely carved knight. Certainly not her.

  “You could always move your queen to the left,” Cougar offered the suggestion with the same helpful attitude with which he’d offered about twenty others.

  “I can’t believe you’d suggest anything so unscrupulous!” Mara exclaimed, pretending an outrage she didn’t actually feel.

  “Hey,” Cougar threw up his hands in self-defense, looking as innocent as a lamb. “It was just a suggestion.”

  He wasn’t fooling her for a minute. “Some suggestion. If I move my queen there, you’ll have my king in check.”

  “I fail to see anything wrong with that.”

  She glared at him, trying to keep her lips from twitching. “Now, why doesn’t that surprise me?”

  “Maybe because I’m trying to win this game?”

  She couldn’t help it. She laughed out loud. The man was outrageous, pulling honesty out of thin air, just when it was guaranteed to tickle her funny bone.

  “That could be it.” She took his knight with her queen. “There. That ought to fix you,” she said with a great deal of satisfaction. In three moves, she’d have him in checkmate.

  “It does,” he mourned. “It surely does.”

  His bishop flew across the board and wiped out her queen. “Check.”

  “Oh rats.” She sat back against the pillows and surveyed the wreckage that had once been a carefully laid out attack. There had to be a way out of this. She caught her lip between her teeth as she worked on her options.

  Cougar’s finger coaxed her lip free. She’d long since given up jumping every time he touched her, just as she’d given up protesting. The man had been touching her pretty much incessantly for the last seven hours. Light, non-threatening, addictive touches that seemed as natural to him as laughing. Which had been another fragment of his personality she’d had to get used to. For such a dangerous looking man, with such a dangerous reputation, he was surprisingly fond of laughing.

  She glared at him, seeing the sympathy in his eyes. “Don’t say it,” she warned.

  “Say what?” The slight deepening of the crease beside his mouth alerted her to the smile he was suppressing.

  “Whatever it is you’re itching to say.”

  “Has anyone ever pointed out to you you’re a poor loser?” he asked, cocking his head at her, the move causing his thick black hair to slide over his shoulder, throwing his high cheekbones and golden eyes into sharp relief.

  Not for the first time, it struck her what an exotically handsome man Cougar was. She realized she was on the verge of staring and quickly replied, “No.”

  Curiosity replaced the sympathy in his eyes as he flicked the hair back. “Because you never lose?”

  “Yes.”

  “Don’t take offense, Angel, but your opponents must have been limited in their…”

  “Intellect?” she supplied with a smile.

  He shrugged. “In two moves, you’ll be in checkmate. And I think I was leaning toward the term, ‘ability’.”

  “Well, I only had one person to play with, so maybe I just got used to the way the game always went.”

  She moved her knight to block the check. Cougar took it with his rook.

  “Who taught you to play?”

  “I learned from a book.” She moved her king, hoping to delay the inevitable.

  Cougar paused, his hand hovering over his knight. “You taught yourself to play chess?”

  “Don’t sound so surprised. It’s just a matter of learning the rules.” She waved him on. “Who taught you?”

  “Doc. And a damned wily player he is too, so don’t get snookered into a game with him until you get more experience under your belt.”

  “I’ll keep it in mind.”

  He placed his knight where he wanted it. “Checkmate.”

  She sighed, and studied the board. “Apparently so.”

  “Don’t look so discouraged.”

  He stroked the curve of her cheek with his finger. She missed the warmth of his touch when he took his hand away. “As soon as you learn to pay a little more attention to your defense, we’ll be evenly matched.”

  Her sigh escaped before she could catch it. “So you keep telling me.”

  “You are an impulsive little thing.” He sounded very happy with the lack in her personality. She stared at him a good minute before she remembered what was making him so happy. “Oh darn.”

  “Uh-huh.” His smile was pure anticipation and full of carnal intent. “It’s time to pay up.”

  “You’re not really going to hold me to that bet, are you?”

  “To the letter,” he said, removing the chessboard from between them. “As I recall, it was double or nothing, last count.”

  “But I didn’t mean it!”

  “Angel.” He shook his head reprovingly. “We shook on it.”

  “Only because you got me so mad, spouting all that nonsense about women being naturally less intelligent than men!”

  He placed the chess set on the plank floor and cocked an eyebrow at her. “And who’s the one on the losing end of a bet she wished she hadn’t made?”

  “I made that bet, as you darn well know, because I was sure I wouldn’t lose.” She straightened the sheet over her legs.

  He smiled a wolfish smile that sent chills up her spine. “But you did lose and I am not about to let you welsh.”

  There seemed so much of him, leaning over her so quickly, she instinctively shrank back into the pillows propped behind her back.

  “You, Mrs. McKinnely, owe me ten kisses.”

  Her response to that aura of power he emitted, annoyed her. She crossed her arms over her chest and put some steel into her spine. “I would rather have you do ten days of dishwashing.”

  “That’s what comes of overconfidence.” He brushed his lips across her forehead.

  “That’s one,” she hastened to point out. She felt his smile against her hair.

  “So it is.” He kissed the end of her nose. “And that’s two.”

  Her fists clenched at her side. The eight more to go loomed ominously in her mind. What if he went mad with lust before he collected all of the de
bt? Try as she might to stay calm, she couldn’t control the shakiness of her breathing. He was so big and he could hurt her so much with so little effort. She closed her eyes and fought panic.

  His third kiss landed on the back of her right hand. His fourth on the curve of her cheek. He pried open her fist to place the fifth in the hollow of her hand.

  “That’s five. Are you keeping count?” he asked, amusement lurking in his voice.

  Her whispered “Yes,” sounded smothered to her own ears. Lord knows what he made of it.

  “Good.” She felt his lips brush feather light across her left eyelid. “Count for me,” he whispered.

  She swallowed and managed a six. Another whisper of sensation, this time across her right eye. “Seven.”

  His finger skimmed her cheek and she jumped. “Steady,” he coaxed as he snagged her chin in the curve of his thumb. His lips, warm and firm, touched hers. “Eight,” she mumbled, doing her best not to increase the contact.

  His laughter puffed against her mouth. He seemed to have none of her reluctance about touching as he pointed out, “It doesn’t count until I take my lips away.”

  It felt strange, his mouth moving on hers as he spoke. Not unpleasant, not threatening, just strange.

  “Oh.”

  He didn’t say anything more, just pressed his lips to hers. Occasionally, he would move them differently, but mostly, he just left them connected to hers. She supposed she should feel threatened, but mostly, she just felt bored. “Are you done yet?”

  She felt his lips purse and then spread in a smile before he moved a fraction away. “Go ahead.”

  “Eight.”

  The tension left her body with the word. Two more to go. Certainly nothing to get worked up about. Especially since the only thing she had to worry about was resisting the urge to yawn when he dragged it on too long.

  “Put your hands on my shoulders.”

  She looked at him. There was nothing on his face to suggest he was up to anything. She stared him straight in the eye as she asked, “Is it necessary?”

  He flicked her nose with his. “Yes.”

  What harm could it do? “Fine.”

  She placed her hands on his shoulders. The hard, broad curve of muscle forced her palms flat. She squeezed experimentally. There was no give. He was an incredibly strong man. Fear flared for a moment. She squashed it.

  She’d picked this path for herself. Before God she’d made vows. He was her husband. She had no right to deny him anything. It said so in the Bible and in the law of the land. She closed her eyes, gave him her trust and tilted up her face.

  Something warm and wet touched the corner of her mouth. His tongue? The resulting sensation jerked her back and curled her fingers into the flesh beneath them. Before she could decide whether she liked the streak of feeling or not, Cougar was asking, “How many?”

  “Nine.”

  “One more to go.” His drawl slid along her awareness. She kept her eyes closed and held her breath. She had no idea what he would do next, but if she had a choice between the boring kiss and the streaky kiss, she opted for the latter.

  She felt him lean toward her. Her hands naturally slid down his back. His chest brushed hers as his breath touched her face. Her breath threatened to explode from her lungs, and still he held them so. She drew her fingers up his back in silent encouragement. Every fiber of her being strained to detect a sign of what he planned. Beyond a quiet “ah”, he gave no indication.

  Finally, when her nerves were stretched so tight, she was ready to scream, she felt that same moist attention to the other corner of her mouth. Only this time, it was more acute. She pulled Cougar closer, not wanting him to draw away before she understood the nature of the feeling.

  He didn’t. Instead, he did something more, something that drew out the pleasurable sensation. Something that made goose bumps chase down her arms and chest. Her “oh” of surprise mingled with his muffled exclamation as she jerked him closer in a reflexive response.

  The tips of her breasts brushed his chest. The same sensation curling down from her mouth radiated outwards from their tips and a whole new set of goose bumps paraded across her skin.

  Cougar pulled away. “How many?” he asked, his voice husky and deep.

  “Ten.”

  The bed shifted as he got to his feet.

  “Damn, that’s a pretty sight.”

  Mara opened her eyes. She looked where he was looking, and saw the tents her nipples made against the white cotton of her nightgown.

  “Oh God!” Why had she been cursed with such big nipples? She grabbed the sheet and pulled it over her head.

  “It’s all right, Mara.” Through the sheet, she saw his shadowy form, standing by the bed. “I’m your husband.”

  “I have news for you, McKinnely. That does not make everything all right with me.”

  “A man could hope.”

  “And hell could freeze over,” she rebutted. Because the sheet didn’t seem thick enough to disguise them, she put her hands over the peaks of her breasts.

  A narrow shadow stretched over her head. The sheet was snatched off her head and she was suddenly sitting exposed in the soft lamplight. It happened so fast, she could only blink at first, staring at Cougar whose gaze dropped to where her hands covered her breasts. His smile edged with something darker. He dragged the sheet down her body, exposing her nightgown and a good deal of thigh. Mara had to scramble to cover her knees and calves with her nightgown.

  She moved too fast and her ribs protested. She had to stop with her left calf and foot still exposed. She leaned back against the headboard, holding her side, panting slightly.

  Cougar’s hand replaced hers just below her knee. His skin was dark against her white flesh, his hand massive compared to her small frame.

  “Looks like Dorothy and Doc are staying in town for the night,” he said, his calm drawl giving no indication that he saw the panic that raced through her with the statement.

  It was their wedding night. They were alone. And her husband was standing by her bed with his hand on her leg. Mara took a deeper breath as the pain in her ribs eased. It helped ease the tension in her body.

  Cougar smoothed her nightgown down over her ankles, restoring her modesty.

  “I’ve got to go out and get the stock settled. Why don’t you get some rest while I’m out?”

  “I’m not tired.”

  He paused at the bedroom door. His left brow kicked up, and his lips twitched with a smile.

  “You’re going to be.”

  Chapter Nine

  Cougar slipped quietly back into the bedroom. He was a married man. This was his wedding night, and his bride was passed out cold in the hard chair set up beside the bed, her head resting on the quilt. He stepped up beside her. Her hair glowed in the light from the oil lamp. Thick and wavy, it spread around her like a living thing. He touched his hand to the spot where her hair parted and he could see the three stitches Doc had neatly placed. Around the stitches, blood still matted in her hair.

  He grazed the back of her cheek with the back of his hand. The soft, almost invisible hairs there tickled his knuckles. Her skin appeared the softest cream. He still wasn’t sure why she’d married him, but she had and now she was his to protect and to care for. And right now, that included a bath.

  “Put your arms around my neck,” he whispered.

  She blinked at him owlishly, caught between sleep and wakefulness. He slid one hand under her hips. The other behind her shoulders.

  “I fell asleep?” she asked as he eased her forward.

  “Yes.”

  “I’m not tired.”

  “Good.” He lifted her into his arms, surprised again by how light she was.

  “Wherever it is we’re going, I can walk there.”

  “It’s our wedding night.”

  She put a hand over her mouth, stifling a yawn. “So?”

  “Every bride gets carried over the threshold.”

  She looked aroun
d the McKinnely living room. “I don’t think this qualifies.”

  “I’m improvising,” he answered, stepping around a footstool.

  He could tell from the tension in her muscles that she was coming fully awake. He let her legs slide down his thighs as he reached the water closet door. He bent his legs so hers could touch the floor. He kept one hand on her shoulder as he opened the door.

  Steam wafted out. Along with it came the scent of the rose-scented bath salts he’d put in the water. Mara froze under his hand, her eyes glued to the claw-foot tub Doc had special ordered for Dorothy. It was deep and big. And it was as full as Cougar could get it without drenching the floor. Looking at Mara and the depth of the tub, he might have overdone it.

  “You prepared a bath for me?”

  There was shock in the question. Amazement. And a longing that went way beyond deep. He’d thought she’d enjoy a bath for the simple reason that she was an intensely feminine woman and all women liked baths, but now he wondered how long it had been since she’d had a real bath. The boarding house charged two bits for the luxury, and he knew Mara hadn’t had a cent to spare.

  “Yes.”

  She turned to face him. Her eyes were huge, as if she were seeing him for the first time and couldn’t reconcile what she saw with what she knew.

  “Thank you.”

  “My pleasure.” Or at least it would be.

  She was still staring at him.

  “What?” he asked.

  “My bath is getting cold.”

  She wanted him to leave. He hadn’t intended to do that. The whole time he had been in the barn, he’d been fantasizing about getting his hands on her hot little body, but now, looking at her, the anticipation in her eyes, knowing this was something she’d longed for, he knew he would wait a little longer.

  “I’ll be right outside if you need me.”

  She was shutting the door in his face before he could get the last word out.

  “I won’t.”