by Carol Finch
He jerked upright when the realization of what Hanna had done fully soaked in. She’d purchased his dream and furnished it with him in mind. This was the ranch he hadn’t been able to share with his half brother. This wasn’t Hanna’s dream. It was his!
“Why’d you do this?” he asked, his searching gaze fixed on her.
Her lashes swept up and she smiled at him. “Because I thought if you ever stopped through here, in between your forays for Parker, it might feel like the home you always wanted and never had. Even if you couldn’t stay forever I wanted you to realize you were always welcome here.”
He leaned down to brush his lips over hers in a gentle kiss. No one had ever gone to such extremes for him. No one had ever taken his wants and needs into consideration. Only Hanna, who made it a habit of placing others’ needs before her own.
God, she humbled him, awed him. And at the same time she made him feel important enough to merit this kind of preferential treatment. Yet the deep-seated voice of unworthiness kept whispering that he’d done nothing to deserve her and wasn’t entitled to this chance at happiness.
When her arms glided gingerly up his chest and around his neck, mindful of his injured arm and bruises too numerous to mention, Cale buried his face in the waterfall of silver-blond hair. He savored the unforgettable scent of her, marveled at the satisfaction he derived from holding her in his arms.
“I want you to stay with me always,” she whispered. He smiled ruefully. “In a perfect world I could stay right here and we could love each other. Society might eventually accept it.”
“Society can go hang,” she countered, holding on to him fiercely. “And because we love each other it is a perfect world. You are my dream come true.”
“I never figured to be anyone’s dream come true, Mags. When people treat you like you’re only half-human and second rate all your life, you start thinking maybe you are, that maybe you don’t deserve to wish for the same dreams that other folks chase. I was afraid to tell you how I felt because I thought you’d be better off without me.”
“Oh, Cale, I’d like to round up all those people who made you believe you were unworthy and undeserving and take after them with a shotgun. You’re the most remarkable man I’ve ever met.”
“When your own mother looks at you as if you are her worst nightmare revisited it’s hard not to think you don’t really belong anywhere except in the wilds with the other inhuman creatures of nature,” he murmured, admitting to his long-harbored insecurities for the first time in his life.
Cale held on tightly, amazed at all the deeply buried feelings and thoughts that suddenly bubbled up like a geyser, as if he couldn’t make a fresh new start with Hanna until she knew him completely.
She was crying now, bleeding tears for him. And that’s when he knew beyond all doubt that he truly had her heart. She cared about him the same way he cared about her—cared so much that she’d been willing to live out his dream for him, even when he’d been afraid to let himself believe in all those magical possibilities.
Cale felt tears clouding his own eyes—an unprecedented occurrence that would have humiliated him if anyone but Hanna had witnessed it. But she was the other half of his soul, the pure light that drew him from the darkness and shadows. He was no longer inferior, no longer just an accident of birth cast out in the world to live and die, unwanted and unloved.
He mattered because Hanna cared. She made him special, worthy.
“Well, that’s a damn good start.”
Hanna and Cale sprang apart at the sound of Malloy’s booming voice rolling through the bedroom.
“Try knocking next time,” Cale said, and scowled. “And when you come for future visits, I insist on at least a week’s warning.”
Malloy stared at him pointedly. “Do we have a deal or not, Elliot?” he demanded.
Hanna gasped in outrage as her gaze bounced between Cale and her father. “Did you bribe him to come here, Papa?”
“Don’t go getting all wounded and defensive, little girl,” Malloy said, undaunted by Hanna’s disapproving glare. “I didn’t bribe the man to come out here. I only bribed him to give me a grandchild…or three.”
Her mouth fell open. “I swear to goodness, Papa, your audacity never ceases to amaze me. One minute I think we’ve reconciled and the next instant you’re trying to dictate my life all over again.”
Smiling, Cale leaned close to Hanna. “Surely you know me better than to believe I’d take a bribe, Mags.”
“Well, I should certainly hope not!” she huffed.
“I was planning to give him a grandchild…or three…for free,” he added confidentially as his wandering hand settled familiarly on her hip, giving her a playful squeeze. “I’m committed to doing the incredibly pleasurable deed as many times as it takes to produce results.”
While Hanna blushed profusely, Malloy strutted over to press a kiss to her brow. “I’m headed to New Orleans in a few hours, now that I’m assured I have everything going my way out here in the outback of society. But I will return. You can depend on it.”
“I was afraid of that,” Cale said in mock regret. Truth be told, Malloy was starting to grow on him—in an exasperating sort of way.
“Be happy,” Walter murmured fondly. “I do love you, though I’m years too late in saying it.” His graying brows flattened over his narrowed gaze as he focused his stern attention on Cale. “And as for you, Elliot, you better make my little girl happy or I’ll become a permanent fixture in this house to ensure that you do!”
When Malloy sauntered out the door, Hanna plucked at the buttons on Cale’s shirt. “I don’t suppose you feel up to practicing making babies yet.”
The prospect of getting naked with Hanna caused desire to slam through him with astonishing speed. He hadn’t been sure he’d recovered enough after the strenuous physical exertion from six days’ past, but apparently he had because her suggestion got an instant rise out of him.
He grinned as he led her to the bed. “With the right incentive I could be persuaded,” he assured her wickedly.
“And what incentive might that be?” she asked as she helped him shed his shirt.
“What happened to that obscene little passion-red garment you assured your father that I wouldn’t approve of?”
She arched an amused brow. “You liked it, did you?”
“On you, Mags, I loved it.” He waggled his brows suggestively. “I’ve even had a few fantasies about it during my laudanum-induced dreams.”
She smiled saucily at him. “Well, I wouldn’t want to disappoint you, my dear husband. After all, I live to please you.” She sauntered to the dresser to pluck up the outrageously seductive garment, then stepped behind the dressing screen.
He had never undressed so quickly in his life. Although he looked like a walking bruise, he’d been thoroughly assured that Hanna loved him for who he was deep down inside. The way he looked on the outside wasn’t what mattered most to his wife.
Cale was lying in bed, waiting in eager anticipation, when Hanna reappeared in that skimpy little creation that made him want to throw back his head and howl. Damn, she was bewitching and seductive.
And her heart belonged to him. He hadn’t had to earn her respect and affection and loyalty. She offered it unconditionally, and Cale had never understood what that meant until Hanna came into his life like a refreshing breath of air.
When she approached the bed, doing her amusing imitation of Millie Roberts’s drumroll saunter, Cale made a visual feast of her. She definitely had his undivided attention and his everlasting affection. When she leaned over him, her breasts came dangerously close to spilling from that scrap of red lace. Cale groaned aloud.
“You like, Mr. Big Tough Deputy Marshal?” she purred provocatively.
“I love,” he murmured as he pulled the pins from her hair and let the silky strands cascade over his hand. “It’s my first time in love. I never understood what love was about until you barged into my life to propose marriage.�
�
Hanna eased down beside him and swept her hand lightly over his chest. Her dewy lips grazed his shoulder, then his neck. “I was searching for the perfect husband and I found him in you,” she whispered.
“You said there were two things that prevented me from being the perfect husband,” he reminded her huskily. His hand drifted over the lush swells of her breasts, feeling her immediate response. “One—learn when to keep your trap shut. What was the other?”
“Two—love me forever,” she told him as she stared deeply into his eyes. “The second is vastly more important than the first. Your love is all I need to make me happy.”
“Then I guess that makes me absolutely perfect for you, Magnolia Blossom,” he drawled, mimicking her Southern accent. “No one’s ever gonna love you the way I do. Starting now. Until long past forever.”
And then he made love to his wife with a gentle reverence that only she called from him. He whispered his love over every inch of her responsive body, giving all that he was—the very best of what he was—to her forevermore.
He came to Hanna eagerly, breathlessly, urgently. He became a vital part of her and she became the most vital part of him. Hanna made him believe that, of all the men who walked the face of the earth, he was the shining example of the perfect husband. He knew when to be silent and he knew how to love her with every beat of his heart, and to the depths of his soul.
Call it fate. Call it destiny, Cale mused as he and Hanna tumbled over the edge of rapturous oblivion. But it was meant to be. Because only now, only with Hanna, did he fully understand and accept who he was. He was, he thought as he lay spent and secure in his wife’s loving arms, the perfect husband for Hanna.
And that was all that truly mattered in life.
ISBN: 978-1-4603-6036-1
BOUNTY HUNTER’S BRIDE
Copyright © 2002 by Connie Feddersen
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.
All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.
This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
® and TM are trademarks of the publisher. Trademarks indicated with ® are registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the Canadian Trade Marks Office and in other countries.
Visit us at www.eHarlequin.com
*Bachelors of Hoot’s Roost
