She moved forward and began to carefully remove his bandages. The scar was rough and jagged, and she wished she had the skills to make it less than what it was. But she had done her best with her limited resources and the extent of his injury.
She sighed heavily. “Your leg is inflamed and swollen. Traveling this hard could cause you to damage it even further.”
“I have no other choice, angel. My daughter is out there, and for all we know she may be caught in the middle of a battle. I have to get to her.”
Olivia shook her head at him, then rummaged through one of the saddle bags and pulled out a new jar of the lotion Serena and her Comanche friend had made. She dipped her fingers into the lotion and began to gently massage it into Cade’s leg. His low moan of appreciation brought a smile to her lips. Her fingers moved smoothly over his skin, her thumbs pressing into the painful muscle to try and give it relief.
He sighed and leaned his head back against the tree, his eyes closed. Olivia took the opportunity to admire him. His blonde hair, which had grown so much longer while in her care, was tied back away from his face with a piece of leather strap. She had given him a shave only a couple of days earlier, but already his square jaw was dark with the growth of his beard.
His lips were full and firm, and lifted slightly at the pleasure of her touch on his sensitive skin. His nose was almost straight, but there was a slight curve in it that made him even more charming in her eyes. And then there were his eyes. His bright blue eyes that seemed they could see into her very soul.
It was at that moment that she realized his eyes were open, watching her. She blinked hard and felt the blood rushing to her face as she looked back down at his leg. She did her best to concentrate on massaging his leg until his finger hooked under her chin and lifted her face up until her eyes clashed with his.
There was a fire in his eyes, a fire she recognized and it stoked the one within her as well. Without waiting for him to ask, without waiting for him to make the first move, she leaned forward and pressed her lips to his, moving them sensuously as she had learned from him.
He received her kiss with enthusiasm, his hands reaching for her waist and pulling her closer to him. She ran her hand along his face, then down to his neck, then landed on his collarbone. Her fingers felt the strength of his shoulders and her hand slipped lower, dipping inside his shirt to feel the warmth of his chest and the crisp blonde hair.
“Angel,” he whispered against her lips, his fingers squeezing her waist.
She knew what she was doing was inappropriate. But she was already destined to live her life as an old maid. She would enjoy her love now, and take pleasure in it while it lasted.
Her heart thundered madly. She loved him. Somehow she had fallen in love with the man that had disrupted her life and made her break all her rules on propriety. A man who had tested her patience, her discipline, and above all, her preconceived notions of the way things should be between a man and a woman.
She pressed into his kiss more deeply, parting her lips for the taste of him. She moved closer, pressing her chest against his. It seemed as if every single fiber of her being was tuned in to his body, the feel of his muscles bunching beneath her fingers, the feel of his heart beating rapidly beneath her palm.
Ignoring propriety all together, she moved even closer to him and placed one leg on each side of him, straddling him with her skirts bunched up around them. He drew in a deep breath at her bold move and his hand shifted to her hips where he pulled her tightly against him. It was in that moment that she realized he desired her, and desired her with a passion that matched her own.
His lips dropped to her neck and she let her head fall backwards, giving him all the access he needed. His hands forcefully gripped her bottom and rocked her against him and she couldn’t restrain the soft cry of pleasure. She was desperate to feel more of him, to finally embrace the way lovers embrace, to feel the ecstasy she had only heard were rumors. But she knew they couldn’t be rumors. The pleasure she was feeling in his arms at that moment alone let her know that ecstasy was achievable.
Her hands slid into his hair, pulling it free from the leather thong and let it fall loose, enjoying the soft blonde curls. She couldn’t contain another soft cry of excitement and pleasure as he rocked her against him. Her breasts felt heavy and ached with a need she knew he could satisfy. With fingers moving quickly, she had her dress down to her waist before giving it a second thought.
Moaning softly, he dropped his head to her breasts, slowly teasingly, pulled a taut nipple into his mouth. When he suckled upon it, she arched against him, her breathing so ragged and her heart racing in her chest so fast she feared she would pass out on him.
“Angel.” He breathed against her wet nipple. “Sweet, sweet angel.”
His lips found her other nipple and suckled upon it just as hard and before she knew what she was doing, she was hastily moving their clothing, trying to get closer to him. His teeth nibbled on the sweetly throbbing nipple, and she nearly had their clothes parted, ready to ease the ache that had built to a firestorm inside her.
He rocked her against him again, hard this time, and she whimpered as something deep within her clenched in a pleasurable pain. “Do you want this?” he asked breathlessly against her ear, his breathing just as ragged as hers. To make his point he pulled her against him again, and this time she could feel intimately the pressure against her, the pressure that would be relieved soon.
“Yes, oh, Cade, yes,” she whispered urgently. “I want this, Cade. I want you, all of you.”
He pulled her head down for a deep, passionate kiss as his hand fumbled with her skirts. Finally, his hand had penetrated the sea of fabric and his fingers ran lightly over her swollen, damp need and he kissed her through her shuddering gasp of pleasure.
This time she rocked against him, hard, realizing her ache was about to be soothed. “Oh, yes, Cade. I want you. I want this, Cade. I love you so very much!”
Suddenly his motions stopped and he was gripping her waist again, squeezing it tightly, his eyes closed and his breathing rapid.
“Cade,” she whispered, and moved against him and he moaned and she could tell he wanted this as badly as she did. But something was holding him back, and he held tightly to her waist, controlling her movements as his breathing slowly came under control.
When he opened his eyes, the blue was sharp and focused. “What did you say, Olivia?” his voice was still hoarse.
Olivia didn’t understand why he had stopped. They were so close. So very close. “I love you, Cade. I want to share everything with you, including my body. And I want to claim your body as mine, for as long as you’ll let me have it.”
A shudder ran through him, and he let out his breath slowly. “Angel, you can’t love me. You can’t.”
Much to her surprise he was pulling up the sleeves of her dress and gradually refastening the bodice. “I-I don’t understand. Cade, isn’t this what you wanted, too? Don’t lie to me. I could feel it. I could feel you.”
He was already lacing up the rest of her dress and he shook his head at her. “No. It was wrong for me to take advantage of you like that.”
“Take advantage of—well, I never!”
“Exactly,” Cade said sharply, looking at her with his intense blue eyes. “You’ve never been with a man. You don’t know what it is like.”
“From everything I could tell it was going to be something incredible!” She wished she had her voice. Her statements coming out as hoarse rasps weren’t helping her.
“It would have—I mean, it is—with the right person, it is amazing. But I’m not the right person for you, Olivia. You can’t love me. I can’t let you love me.”
Olivia was in stunned shock when he slipped her from his lap and began to very quickly pull up his britches and stuff in his shirt. He had his britches laced and was turned away from her, leaning against the tree.
He had turned her away. She had been so terribly wrong, so terribly, terribly w
rong. She had thought he desired her, that he saw her differently than the other men she had encountered in her life. She had thought he would treasure her and enjoy this precious time together. She had been a fool.
“Olivia,” he said finally, turning to face her, but she held up her hand as she stood and brushed off her skirt and gathered the jar of balm for his leg.
“You don’t need to say anything else. You’ve said enough.” She concentrated on placing the jar back carefully in the saddlebag, fighting hard to keep her tears from falling. She was a complete idiot for thinking any man would find her desirable.
She wasn’t prepared when Cade caught her arm and pulled her up to face him. His expression was tight and hard to read. “I don’t think you understand me, Olivia.”
“I understand you perfectly well, Cade. Please, allow me to save what little dignity I have left and let me gather the horses. We’ve wasted far too much time here.”
A myriad of emotions swept across his face quickly before he released her and let her go to the horses. It was as she untethered the two horses that Olivia allowed only a few tears to fall. But a few tears were all she would allow. She wouldn’t be a fool ever again.
Chapter Eighteen
They rode until dusk and, despite the chill in the air, Cade wasn’t willing to risk the danger of a fire. Olivia had come prepared with a thick blanket and used her horse saddle as a pillow. Cade, too, had brought a thick blanket and, for a moment, he considered asking Olivia to lie with him so they could share each other’s warmth.
But she already had her back to him and was wrapped tightly in her blanket before he even had the chance to ask. He sighed heavily and wrapped the blanket around him, used the saddle blanket from his horse as an extra layer of warmth, and rested his head against his horse’s saddle.
He had hurt her. God, it had felt so incredible to hold her the way he had, to touch her so intimately, and to know that if he wanted, he could feel sweet release with her. And she had been so passionate in his arms. He had never had another woman so free and loving in his arms. He had never had a woman desire him in such a way, so intently, with every fiber of her being.
Even in the early stages of his marriage, his wife had treated lovemaking as a chore, a task required of her as his wife. And after she had passed, he had sought comfort in the arms of a couple other women, but their movements had been awkward, hesitant, and nowhere near as tantalizing as Olivia. He had made the mistake of forgetting his pledge to himself, that he wouldn’t be with her because it wasn’t right. She deserved a better man, and he couldn’t be the man to take away her virginity. That would ruin her forever.
But then she had whispered the deadly words. “I love you.” He couldn’t deny it—hearing her utter those words as she was writhing her sweet body against his had nearly been his undoing. But instead, after a few seconds, it was as if someone had thrown a bucket of ice water on him.
She couldn’t love him. Everything about him was wrong for her. She had been caught up in the moment and uttered the words out of passion, not out of true love. Or, at least, that was what he hoped it was.
The alternative was an even bigger problem. Every person he loved in his life either died, or, in Bella’s case, was being used as a pawn in a war. He had loved his wife, though it was more fondness than love, but it had still hurt when she had died when Bella was born. And he had loved his son more than words could express. Bella was all that he had left, and he didn’t know if she was even still alive.
It was a curse for him to love someone. And, in his mind, it was just as much a curse for someone to love him in return. He didn’t know if he was capable of returning the unconditional love that Olivia seemed to be offering him. The idea of Olivia being hurt because of his actions, or because she simply loved him, was more than he could bear.
He rolled over in his blanket, trying to get comfortable. The desire in her eyes when she looked at him... it was something he had never thought he would see. And on top of that, his desire for her had nearly clouded his ability to think at all. He had wanted her. He had never wanted a woman more in his life. But he would be damned if his own desires hurt another person in his life. She had already been through far too much for his sake.
He turned again and lay on his back, trying to focus on anything else to get some sleep. It was as he lay there that he heard her. Her teeth were chattering and she was letting out soft gasping sounds as she tried to gain warmth.
To hell with her anger. She could be angry at him in the morning after she had a relaxing warm sleep. Picking up his saddle and the saddle blanket he was using for extra warmth, he moved to wear she lay.
“What do you think—” Her words were cut off as he pulled her out of her tightly wrapped blanket and into his arms. He then wrapped both blankets around them, lay down, and spread out the saddle blankets on top of them as well. He then settled down with his head on his saddle, and her head on her saddle.
She didn’t make any further protests, but his own body did. He hadn’t thought through his actions and how they would bring her close to him, where he could smell her fresh scent, and feel her soft form near his. Damn, he wasn’t going to get sleep no matter what he did.
Travel was slow. Olivia continued to ask for breaks, but the real purpose was for the sake of Cade’s leg. If she told him that, though, he would hardly stop at all. Serena had packed the saddlebags well, and they certainly weren’t lacking for food.
But Olivia found it hard to eat. She realized she had been a fool to think she was attractive, to think that a man could ever want her in the way a man wanted a woman. But she had thought, she had felt, as if Cade desired her in that way. But it very well could be the fact that he hadn’t been with a woman in a long time, and he had thought he could lower his standards to her.
She was past the point of being sad, and had even gotten past the point of being mad at Cade. She couldn’t force something that didn’t exist. But she hated herself. She had even gone so far as professing to him that she was in love with him. Which was the truth, but she wished she had kept it to herself.
In spite of her bruised pride, she still insisted on massaging the balm into his leg each day. She would make sure Bella got her father back in as good of condition as possible. Much to her relief, he didn’t try to talk to her when she was working on his leg.
During their travel they didn’t talk either. They rode in silence, heading east, following behind Santa Anna. As they went through small towns along the way, they would meet various people who would speak of Santa Anna’s journey, the destruction he left behind, and the young girl that rode with one of the camps. They also learned of the Goliad Massacre, where Santa Anna had ordered the execution of four hundred Texians.
While the news was disheartening, the information about a young girl in one of the camps gave them continued hope. Many of the people grumbled that Houston was retreating instead of fighting, while still others believed the United States would come to their aid once they were close enough to the Louisiana border.
They had been traveling for nearly a week when Cade felt it was safe enough for them to have a small fire and Olivia cooked them fresh biscuits and bacon. Coyotes howled in the distance as they sat near the fire, eating the first warm food they’d had in a long time.
Olivia ate for the first time in nearly two days, and the biscuit filled her stomach quickly. The bacon had been a nice change to the dried jerky, and she hoped Cade enjoyed it as much as she had. He’d been eating consistently, but he was bound to be ust as tired of the dried venison as she.
After placing the remainder of the biscuits carefully to the side of the fire and covering them with the heavy cast iron lid, she gathered her blanket and saddle blanket together, and was just reaching for her saddle when a tanned hand reached around her and grabbed it.
She turned and found herself nearly nose-to-nose with Cade, his blue eyes watching her intently. “What-what are you doing?” she stammered, caught off guard by his
proximity. She had done everything she could to give him distance, since that seemed to be what he wanted from her.
“We need to talk,” he said softly, his eyes never leaving hers.
Olivia swallowed hard. “There isn’t anything for us to talk about,” she replied reaching for her saddle, but he held it out of her reach.
“The hell there isn’t. I’m tired of a week of your silence. The first few days I thought it was because your throat still hurt. But you are talking just fine, now, and you need to understand some things.”
Olivia shook her head and began to step around him, but his hand caught her upper arm, holding her still.
She looked over at him with surprise. “I don’t understand, Cade. What do you want from me?”
He sighed heavily and released her, turning to place her saddle where she would sleep for the night. He proceeded to grab his own items and placed them next to hers and waited patiently for her to move. Slowly she walked towards him and spread out her blanket and saddle blanket the same as they had every night, where they would be wrapped together for warmth against the unusually cold spring nights.
He gestured with his hand for her to lie down, and she wondered if he had changed his mind and decided not to talk with her after all. She felt relief and disappointment at the same time. She craved the sound of his voice, craved his gentle touch, craved the things they had before she had made a fool of herself. She had ruined everything between them.
She stretched out on the blanket, taking her usual position where she would be facing away from him. “No,” he said, and she looked at him quizzically. “Turn around. Tonight you’re going to face me and you’re going to listen to what I have to say.”
Hesitantly, Olivia rolled to her other side, watching him with trepidation. What was so important that he needed to talk to her? She already knew the truth as he had made that quite obvious when he had pushed her away. She was there to help him find Bella, and she wouldn’t back out of that decision, no matter what he had to say. Perhaps that was what he wanted to talk to her about. Perhaps he no longer wanted her on this journey with him.
Texas Desire Page 18
