A Lady of the West

by Linda Howard

  He picked her up in his arms and carried her to the bed. For the first time Victoria actively fought him, trying frantically to get away. She felt painfully exposed, so much at the mercy of his much greater strength and rampant sexuality that she lost control. She kicked and hit at him, trying to pull free and throw herself off the bed. He subdued her easily, catching her hands and pinning them over her head, controlling her legs with his powerful ones.

  “Easy now,” he said soothingly, his breath warm against her face. “Don’t be afraid, honey, you have no reason to be afraid. I’m not going to hurt you.” His voice was low and reassuring, and he bent his head to brush his mouth across the tender joint of her neck and shoulder.

  The hot touch of his mouth on her bare skin made her jump, and with an incoherent cry she strained upward again. He held her down, wondering why she was so frightened. Surely she knew he wasn’t going to hurt her. But maybe her experiences with the Major had been even more unpleasant than he’d thought, maybe she truly expected the worst of him. His body was screaming for him to take off his pants and enter her now, but relief wasn’t all he wanted. Victoria was so much a lady, but she was also a woman of passion and he wanted her to give him that passion. He wanted her to cling to him, her body arching to receive him rather than trying to throw him off; he wanted to feel the soft internal clenching of her release.

  “Victoria. Look at me, honey. Stop fighting and look at me.”

  “Get off of me,” she cried in a stifled voice.

  “No, I won’t get off.” He shifted control of her wrists to one hand, and with the other caught her chin and turned her head toward him. Her eyes were wet with tears, he saw, but she hadn’t allowed them to fall. He kissed her temple in appreciation of her pride, then moved his lips to her cheek. “You don’t have to be afraid,” he repeated softly, and brushed a kiss at the corner of her mouth.

  “Don’t do this, please don’t do this to me.” The words burst out, and she was dimly appalled to realize she was begging. She’d sworn she wouldn’t do that, but the stark reality of being stripped naked had also stripped her of pride. She would grovel if it would stop him from hurting and humiliating her this way. “I’ll leave, I promise I will. We’ll leave in the morning if you want—”

  “Now, why would I want that?” he murmured, the corners of his mouth kicking up in amusement. He leaned over her and lightly rubbed his chest against her nipples.

  The contact, light as it was, rasped across her delicate flesh. She inhaled with a quick, shallow gasp, her concentration splintered. Her nipples were burning, tightening. He did it again, this time increasing the pressure a little, and the traitorous warmth in her began to blur the edges of her fear.

  He kissed her, opening his mouth over hers. He probed her mouth with his tongue, kissing her in the slow, sure, purposeful manner of a man who knows he isn’t going to stop at kisses. She made a muffled sound of protest but he kept on until her lips softened, until he felt some of the tension ease out of her muscles and she began to respond to him.

  She didn’t want to respond; she tried to fight it, only to find herself undermined by her own emotions. When everything was said and done, she loved him. Even knowing he didn’t love her, that his taking of her was part of his hatred for the Major, she couldn’t stop the warm tide of feeling when he touched her. She couldn’t stop herself from welcoming his small invasion with her own tongue and drawing his taste deep inside.

  He stroked his hand in one slow motion from her chin to her throat, and downward to cover her breast. She jerked in shock, alarmed by the first feel of a man’s hand on her bare breast. His palm burned her, and the tightening sensation in her breasts intensified. He gently kneaded, then rubbed his thumb around and over the nipple in a circular motion that made her moan aloud. She tried to jerk her mouth free of his, but Jake deepened the kiss, holding her while he transferred his attentions to her other breast.

  She began to tremble, but no longer from fear.

  He finally lifted his head and looked down at the soft, pale mounds of her breasts, at the tightly beaded nipples. His sinewy, darkly tanned fingers were a rough contrast against her delicate skin. “You’re so damn pretty,” he said, and bent his head to her breasts.

  His mouth closed hotly over her nipple. Victoria cried out, the sound strangled in her throat. Pure sensation jolted her and she arched again, but was still held pinned by his controlling hand and legs. She had never imagined he would use his mouth on her in that way, never anticipated the searing wet heat, or the prickling pressure as he sucked strongly, his cheeks flexing with the movement. His tongue flicked and rolled around her nipple, and she began burning, the heat twisting downward to pool between her legs. She whimpered, aware of the shameful undulation of her hips but unable to do anything to stop it.

  “That’s right, honey,” he whispered. “Let me feel you move.” He shifted his mouth to her other breast, awash in her taste, giddy with the sweet scent of her breasts and the feel of her nipples. She gave another little cry, the sound making him shiver with need.

  He slid his hand down her belly and pushed it between her legs.

  She jerked wildly, shock overcoming pleasure. “No,” she cried, shaking. “Dear God, no!” Her hips bucked as she tried to dislodge him.

  Jake caught her mouth with his, silencing her protest with long, deep kisses. She strained against him, but he kept kissing her until that storm of resistance, too, had passed. When she was limp and shaking, he lifted his mouth.

  “You feel so good, sweetheart. Open your legs for me, let me touch you.”

  “No, it isn’t right, you shouldn’t do that—” She remembered the pain when the Major had shoved his fingers so roughly into her, and she shrank from the memory.

  “Yes, it is right,” he interrupted in a low, warm tone. His eyes were intensely green, burning, and—tender. “I want to touch you, I want to feel how soft and wet you are.”

  She shuddered. “You won’t hurt me?” She wanted his touch. Her body was aching shamelessly for him, but the remembrance of her wedding night kept her from obeying.

  His face tightened. “No, I won’t hurt you,” he promised, and wished bitterly that McLain could come back to life so he could kill him again for daring to hurt this woman. “Open your legs, Victoria.”

  She did, finally, her thighs relaxing enough to allow him to move his fingers. He did so gently, parting the lips of her sex and opening her to his caresses. Victoria shuddered again, acutely aware of the embarrassing moistness she knew he could feel as he lightly stroked her. But this wasn’t like what the Major had done, she thought dazedly. He wasn’t hurting her, he was rubbing her, exploring the sensitive folds with tender fingers, and he was breathing hard as if touching her there excited him beyond bearing.

  “You’re going to like this,” he said, and brushed his thumb across the small nub at the top of her sex. An exquisite pleasure, so intense it was almost painful, shot through her body. She moaned, unaware that her legs opened wider as she arched against his hand.

  He continued using his thumb, drinking in the small sounds she made, loving the way her hips were moving. The scent of her body was hotter, more intoxicating. There was fever in her now, the fever he had craved from the time he had met her, burning high to match his. Soon, very soon, she would be his. She was wet, he thought wet enough, but to make certain he slowly slipped one finger inside her.

  Victoria stiffened when she felt her body penetrated, dazedly bracing herself for the pain, but instead the heavy, burning ache inside her intensified. No, it wasn’t an ache, it was intolerable pleasure. She didn’t know, didn’t care. Her entire body was throbbing. She turned her head against his shoulder as he began moving his finger in and out, the motion enticing her hips into an undulating movement she couldn’t control.

  Jake groaned aloud. She was so small and tight he knew he’d have difficulty entering her, no matter how ready she was. She was so wet, trembling on the verge of satisfaction, that there wa
s no point in delaying any longer.

  Now, finally, he released her hands, but Victoria didn’t think of fighting. It was too late for that. Fire was burning through her, her breasts were aching and there was a deep throb between her legs that she didn’t know how to handle. Her body felt heavy and limp, curiously disobedient. She watched him without comprehension as he got up and stood beside the bed, his hands working at his waistline. Only gradually did she understand that he was unbuttoning his pants, and then only a fraction of a second before he pushed them down and off.

  The lamplight was too bright to be merciful. A return to fear jolted her from her sensual daze, and she rose up on one elbow with one hand lifted as if to ward him off. He was plainly revealed, his strongly muscled body nude, his thick erection rising from the dark curls at his groin. She stared at him in terror. The Major hadn’t looked anything like that. There was no way she could accept him inside her, he was too big, he would tear her apart—

  “No,” she said hoarsely, belatedly trying to twist away.

  Jake hauled her back and mounted her, prying her clenched thighs apart and settling himself between them. Fear exploded within her, out of control, as his rigid shaft probed at the soft folds between her legs.

  “I can’t,” she moaned, thrashing her head from side to side. “Jake, please!”

  “No, everything’s all right,” he soothed. “There won’t be a problem, you’ll see. It’ll slide in so slick and easy you won’t be hurt at all. Just relax, sweetheart.”

  He knew she must be terrified because of what the Major had done to her, but he also knew that because the Major had done it and he didn’t now have to break her hymen, she wouldn’t be forced to endure that pain. No, he intended to make certain that this time would be all pleasure for her.

  He kissed her deeply, and in despair she felt the rise of heat in her again, and the coiling tension that only he could relieve. With a sob she admitted defeat and lifted her hips against him, silently asking for his penetration.

  “Please,” she whispered.

  “All right, darling,” he murmured against her throat.

  There was no way she could relax, no way she could be casual about what was happening to her now. He was going to do what he wanted to her no matter what she did, but accepting the inevitable didn’t help. She was swept along willy-nilly, with no control even over her own body, which begged for his conquest. Her breath burst out of her in a shuddering sigh as he let all of his weight down on her and reached down between her legs, holding her open with one hand while the other guided his manhood. She flinched as he made contact again, his flesh smooth and hot.

  “Jake—”

  “Easy, easy,” he whispered, and nudged the broad tip into her, following with a steady, relentless pressure that forced him past the restrictive tightness of her opening. Victoria pushed convulsively at his waist in an effort to repel the burning invasion of her body. Hot tears slipped down her cheeks, at last uncontrolled. He caught her hands and moved them, pinning them again to the pillow, then continued squeezing into her, inch by slow inch, until he was in her to the hilt.

  “Oh, God,” he groaned, fighting the waves of pleasure that swept over him. She was so tight that he almost couldn’t bear it. To give himself time he held himself still, embedded deeply inside her, and began again the exquisite task of bringing her to pleasure.

  “It’s all right, sweetheart,” he said, kissing her over and over. His penetration had been so difficult, he wondered for an instant about the Major. But he dismissed the thought; he hadn’t felt the telltale resistance of delicate skin when he’d entered her. Still, she was crying and it wrenched at his guts. He wiped her tears away and began to slowly move his hips in the way that would bring her the ultimate ease.

  She lay limply, her gaze fastened on his hard, intent face, accepting the penetration and retreat of his manhood in dazed muteness. When she had imagined this act of ultimate intimacy, she had thought of it in terms of pain and revulsion, unable to comprehend why men seemed to want it so. Now, as her breath caught, she began to understand what, beyond duty, prompted a woman to submit to the act. It wasn’t submission as much as participation, although her body was only now beginning to learn that. The heavy thrust and drag of his maleness was bringing the heat within her to full flame again and concentrating it in her loins.

  It began slowly because both her senses and flesh were still shocked by his invasion, but it was inexorable. The twinges of pleasure became sharper, and as her senses recovered they focused on her own body, bringing it alive in ways she had never anticipated. She smelled the clean sweat that made his body gleam, the musky maleness of his skin, even the new and exciting scents of their lovemaking. She felt his heat, enveloping her. She felt his hardness, the strength of his muscled arms enfolding her, the scrub-board flatness of his belly rubbing against her with each thrust, the powerful thighs that kept her own thighs parted, the hardness of his loins that pressed into her body with each recoil of his hips.

  Her hands moved, slowly and without her awareness, to his shoulders; they were hot and smooth under her palms.

  Her legs lifted and twined sensuously around his hips and thighs.

  Her back arched, tilting her pelvis to receive him more fully.

  And it grew in her, that heat.

  Afterward, she never had any idea of how long they strained together, or when the heat shattered the last of her control. She clung to him, gasping at his strong hands on her breasts, crying out wordlessly when her hips lifted to meet him. His hair was plastered to his skull with sweat; her hands clenched in it, holding him to her. He groaned, too, with the inward thrusts that were driving them into their frenzy. She was liquid fire in his arms; her body burned him, and enchanted him. He took the full measure of her response and gave her his, caught and shattered in a way he had never been before.

  And the heat became too much.

  She clawed at his back, crying again, frantic for release from the incredible tension in her body. She was shuddering, lifting, straining toward him. He drove into her with a heavy rhythm that rattled the bed on its frame. She moaned, knowing that if she didn’t find relief, she would shatter, her heart would burst. And then she discovered that the shattering was the relief. Her loins clenched convulsively around his manhood, then her senses exploded in great waves that lifted her entire body off the bed.

  He caught her hips and pushed deeper into her, thrusting hard. He went taut and reared back, his powerful body arching like a bow as his climax shook him. A hoarse cry burst from his throat and together they died the little death that was a death of self, and an exaltation of life.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  She awoke slowly, feeling a physical soreness and a certain malaise of spirit as she had to face the morning. She would have preferred it to remain night forever, for then she could simply lie in bed with him and push reality away.

  She was alone in the bed, for which she was grateful. Despite the heated carnality they had shared during the night, she didn’t think she’d have been able to blithely crawl naked from the bed in full daylight with him looking on. Nor did she now; she stretched cautiously beneath the twisted, wrinkled sheet. Though her thighs protested and her breasts and lips felt swollen and tender, the only real soreness seemed to be between her legs and to her relief even that wasn’t severe.

  Her depression wasn’t brought on by her physical complaints, which were minor, but by her uncertainty that had, perversely, been increased by his lovemaking. Before, the situation had been that she loved him but wasn’t loved in return. A simple, if painful, reality.

  She still loved him. If she hadn’t done so, she could have resisted him, but she had long ago admitted that she loved the rough, hard-eyed gunman. No matter if he called himself Roper or Sarratt, no matter if he’d sworn vengeance on everything and everyone bearing the McLain name, she loved him. She couldn’t love by half-measures, holding back in self-protection; nor could she stop loving him just because h
e’d lied to her and betrayed her trust. Whether or not he wanted it, he had both her heart and her loyalty. The sense of honor that had kept her with McLain even when she despised him would keep her heart with Jake Sarratt forever. So she had lain beneath him in the night, shocked by the intimacies he’d insisted on, burning with the pleasure he’d given her, and she had become, irrevocably, Jake Sarratt’s woman.

  She had given him everything, her body and her honor, her pride. What deepened the shadows in her eyes was the inner certainty that he didn’t cherish the gift. He had enjoyed her body, but she remembered with sharp pain that he had also enjoyed the body of the woman she’d seen him making love to in the barn.

  The bright sunshine pouring in the window mocked her, but after another moment of lying in bed she answered the mockery by rising. Even though she was alone, her head was high and her back straight as she washed the evidence of the night from her body and methodically dressed herself in her usual modest shirtwaist and plain skirt. After she had picked up her scattered garments from the floor, she sat down at the dresser to put up her hair. It was a moment she had been postponing, because she dreaded looking at herself this morning, afraid the night’s sensuality would show on her face.

  To her relief, she looked much as she always did, although a little paler. Her face was grave and serene, and if there was a depth of new knowledge in her eyes, that at least was to be expected.

  Facing herself in the mirror had been difficult; facing Jake would take every bit of backbone she possessed.

  Jake brooded in the library, a cup of Lola’s strong hot coffee in his hands. The night had not left him untouched, either. He’d known he wanted Victoria; he’d even admitted to being obsessed by her. What he hadn’t known was how strong the obsession was or that now, after taking her, he’d want her even more.

  All of his plans had seemed so simple, but now he was caught. Victoria was a temptation he couldn’t resist, a complication he couldn’t solve. He and Ben had the ranch back, the land that was theirs by birthright but not by law. McLain was dead; though Garnet had survived, it was enough that he was gone. Jake wasn’t inclined to go chasing after him. If Garnet ever crossed his path again, he would kill him, but for now at least Jake was satisfied. Almost.