A Cattleman's Honor Read online

  “Tell me you don’t want to be filled,” he whispered at her lips. “Filled hard, and deep.”

  She made a helpless sound and shivered again, totally helpless.

  His hands went to her jeans, and then to his own, and seconds later, she felt his muscular, hair-roughened nudity against her softness with a sense of wonder. His body echoed the soft shiver of hers.

  “Are you going to let me?” he whispered, drawing his hips against hers.

  “We shouldn’t... Gene,” she choked.

  “Yes, we should,” he whispered tenderly. His hands smoothed down her silky hips, under her thighs, and he lifted them, eased them apart with such gentleness that she couldn’t find a single protest.

  He moved then, fitting himself to her in a silence that smoldered with promise.

  She looked straight into his eyes and gasped softly as he began to possess her, with exquisitely gentle movements.

  “Yes,” he whispered tenderly. “You see? It doesn’t hurt. No, don’t tense up. That’s it,” he coaxed. He took her mouth under his and cherished it. “That’s it, little one. I’m only going to love you. Isn’t that what you said you wanted? To be loved?”

  She’d meant another kind of love entirely, but this was heaven. She wondered if he’d ever been so tender with anyone else, but he moved then, and she couldn’t think anymore.

  He probed her body softly. “Yes, watch my eyes, Allison. You watched me, that night. Now I want to watch you.”

  As he spoke, he moved, slow and easy movements that brought them first into stark intimacy, and then into contact, and then totally together. She gasped as she felt her body absorbing his, stunned with the ease of his passage, the readiness of her own body. She stared into his eyes with wonder, trying to feel guilt and shame, but she couldn’t. She couldn’t have imagined the expression on his lean face in her wildest dreams. His eyes were soft and warm, full of secret knowledge and tenderness and excitement.

  He moved lazily against her, smiling as he settled on her body in a soft rhythm that lifted her very slowly to an ecstasy she’d never dreamed possible.

  She cried out and pushed at his chest, frightened, but he continued the steady rhythm, increasing it now, his breathing suddenly changing as he watched her eyes.

  “Don’t look away,” he said huskily. “I’m going to watch. Now, Allison. Now, little one. Now. Now!”

  She made sounds she’d never made in her life as the sensations gathered and suddenly exploded. She wept in what sounded like anguished pain, her breath trapped in her throat, her face contorted like her convulsing body. He went with her every step of the way, only giving in when she was almost exhausted. He laughed even as his body corded over hers, laughed through the vicious ecstasy that suspended him above her in a shuddering anguish of satisfaction.

  He ground out something and went rigid before he collapsed on her body, his heartbeat shaking both of them. He trembled, as she did, long afterward.

  “I really should have closed the window,” he murmured dryly, feeling the heat in her cheeks. “Don’t curl up. We’re too far from the bunkhouse and the living room for anyone to hear you, and Dwight’s asleep. Did it hurt this time?” he asked, smiling as he lifted his head to search her eyes, knowing the answer already.

  She swallowed. “Oh, no,” she whispered. She was still trembling a little, and so was he. They were both drenched with sweat, but her body felt deliciously boneless, although it still tingled with pleasure. “No, it was...” She searched for the right word as she looked into his soft eyes. “It was beautiful.”

  “That’s how it should be,” he breathed at her ear, gathering her legs in the muscular cage of his as he kissed her tenderly. He lifted his head. “I hope you weren’t disappointed this time.”

  “You were...watching,” she whispered, coloring. “Couldn’t you, well, see?”

  “I saw, all right.” His face hardened with the memory and he kissed her roughly. “I’ve never watched before. I’ve never been satisfied like that before, either. If you don’t marry me, so help me, I’ll move in here with you until I shame you into saying yes.”

  She swallowed. “Gene...”

  He brushed back her damp hair. “Your conscience will beat you to death over this,” he said quietly, drawing her gaze along their bodies until she flushed and averted her eyes. “I didn’t force you or coerce you. It was mutual. We’ve got a lot going for us. I want to live with you, cupcake.”

  “Sex wouldn’t be enough for you,” she whispered sadly. “And you’d have a long time to regret it.”

  “I won’t regret it.” He brushed his mouth over her eyes. And he knew he wouldn’t. He was awash with new feelings, with a tenderness he’d never experienced before. He studied her quietly. “You’ll be everything I ever needed, or wanted. I’ll take care of you until I die. And someday, somehow, I’ll make you glad you said yes.”

  Those words echoed in her mind long after they’d dressed and gone downstairs to announce their engagement. Allison couldn’t decide if she believed him or not; if she dared to believe him. Because it sounded very much as if more than physical need was the basis for the proposal. About that, only time would tell.

  Chapter Ten

  “I just can’t believe it,” Marie said later, smiling at Allison. “I never thought I’d live long enough to see Gene married. Imagine that, my footloose, fancy-free brother not only willing, but anxious to tie the knot! And to someone I really like!”

  “I’m glad of that,” Allison said, but her eyes were troubled.

  Winnie was upstairs with Dwight, and Gene had gone back out to work after a brief lunch. Marie was still getting over the shock of what Gene had announced so matter-of-factly.

  Marie stared at her for a moment. “There’s something more, isn’t there?” she asked gently. “Forgive me for prying, but I know my brother very well and I’ve learned quite a bit about you. Something happened that night that Rance gossiped about, and you think Gene is only marrying you to appease his conscience. That’s it, isn’t it?”

  Allison started to deny it, but there really wasn’t any point. She stared down at her hands folded in her lap. “Yes.”

  “Gene has a conscience,” Marie continued. “But nothing could make him marry a woman in cold blood, not even that. You’d better believe that it isn’t guilt on his part.”

  “There could be a baby,” Allison said painfully, amazed that she could talk to Marie this way when she couldn’t bring herself to tell Winnie about it.

  Marie smiled. “Gene loves children,” she said simply. “So do all the rest of us. A baby would be the sweetest kind of surprise.”

  Allison fought tears and lost. She put her head in her hands and wept bitterly. “I’ve trapped him, all because I got in over my head,” she moaned. “Whatever his motives, inevitably he’ll hate me!”

  Marie hugged her warmly. “No, I don’t think so. Not the way he’s been acting since you’ve been around. You’ve changed him. All the bitterness and mockery are gone. He’s gentler, less volatile.”

  “Mr. Rance wouldn’t agree with you,” Allison said with a watery smile.

  “Mr. Rance deserved what he got,” Marie said shortly. “I don’t feel sorry for him. Now you cheer up,” she told Allison. “No more regrets. You’re the first sister-in-law prospect Gene’s ever presented me with, and I’m not letting you escape!”

  Marie’s enthusiasm was catching. Allison went back up to sit with Dwight in a brighter mood altogether. If she had doubts, she kept them to herself.

  Gene led her off into the study later that night, after they’d had supper, and closed the door.

  She was nervous, and he smiled gently at the expression on her face.

  “Don’t look so threatened,” he said, his green eyes twinkling at her. “The couch is too short, and the desk would be hell on your back.”

  Sh
e blushed, her eyes like saucers as they met his.

  He moved toward her, indulgent and smiling. “How can you still blush?” he asked, drawing her gently to him. “You wide-eyed little innocent.”

  “Not so innocent now,” she said quietly.

  He bent and kissed her softly. “It won’t do much good to ask you not to beat your conscience to death. But try not to go overboard. God made us human, little one,” he said, his voice deep and caressing as he searched her eyes. “He gave us physical pleasure to ensure the perpetuation of the species.”

  “And He gave us responsibility not to make a mockery of it, or twist it into something bad,” she replied miserably.

  He framed her wan face in his lean hands and studied her. “You believed in me when no one else did,” he said. “You weren’t put off by my reputation or intimidated by my temper. You gave yourself to me more than any other reason because you knew how desperately I needed you.” He sighed heavily. “Allison, what we did, that night at the cabin and today, was as natural as breathing. It isn’t hateful to want someone, especially when it goes beyond a physical need.”

  “Did it, though?” she asked sadly.

  He nodded. “Yes. This afternoon, it most certainly went beyond desire.”

  “You were...so tender,” she whispered.

  He drew her against him and enveloped her in his arms, resting his cheek on her dark hair. “It’s going to be that way every time, from now on,” he said. His arms tightened as he felt her warmth and softness so close to him. His body reacted predictably and he laughed. “My God, feel that,” he whispered at her ear.

  “Stop,” she protested in a flutter.

  “You’re a nurse. You should know that I can’t stop it.”

  “That wasn’t what I meant.” She buried her face in his chest and felt him suddenly go stiff and catch his breath.

  His hands moved slowly into her hair. He drew her mouth against him, through the shirt, and his breathing became ragged. “Allison,” he whispered huskily. His eyes closed. He’d never felt so vulnerable, or minded it so little.

  “You like that?” she whispered hesitantly.

  “I like it a lot.” He eased a lean hand between them. “But I’d like it on my bare skin more, sweetheart,” he said, unfastening buttons as he spoke. “Push my shirt out of the way and put your mouth on me,” he whispered sensuously.

  “We shouldn’t,” she protested weakly. “What if...”

  “We’re going to be married,” he said at her forehead. “A piece of paper and the right words aren’t going to bind us any closer than our bodies already have. You’re mine now. I love being part of you, feeling you share my pleasure. Is it really so frightening to let me love you now?”

  “It isn’t...frightening,” she confessed. She rubbed her hands flat against his hair-laden chest, up and down in a sensual pattern.

  He drew her mouth to his warm skin, feeling her lips search through the mat of hair to the hard muscles of his chest and he caught his breath, tautening involuntarily.

  It was intoxicating, she thought dazedly, smoothing her hands over him while her mouth lifted and touched. He smelled of spicy cologne and the touch of his body was all of heaven.

  Her hands smoothed down to his belt and his lips brushed her closed eyelids. “Lower,” he whispered. “I want you to touch me.”

  She hesitated. She was curious, but all her inhibitions were protesting.

  “I belong to you as surely as you belong to me,” he said quietly. “Aren’t you curious about the differences between your body and mine?”

  “Well, yes,” she confessed hesitantly.

  His lips parted against her eyebrows. “Then find them out for yourself.”

  She lay her cheek on his chest and slowly let her cool, nervous hands trespass past the wide belt. He jerked a little at the unfamiliar touch, and she hesitated, but his hands trapped hers when she tried to pull them away.

  “It’s all right,” he whispered against her temple. “I’m no more used to this than you are.”

  “You’re experienced...” she protested.

  “Not in this, I’m not,” he replied, surprisingly. “What we’ve done together is totally new for me, up to and including this. Haven’t you realized that I’m not playing some sophisticated game with you?” he asked. “Allison, I’m as helpless as you are when we make love. Your touch is just as exciting and potent to me as mine seems to be to you.”

  “I didn’t realize that,” she whispered. Under her softly questing hands, his body was powerfully male and very, very responsive. He gasped and she felt his body shudder. “Did I hurt you?” she breathed.

  “No,” he said, his voice faintly choked. “I’m sensitive there.”

  “Oh.”

  “Don’t stop,” he whispered, searching for her lips with his mouth. He opened it to a slow, deep kiss that seemed to have no end, glorying in her tender exploration of him. He guided her hand to the zipper and groaned helplessly when she touched him under the fabric. They wound up on the couch in a tangle of arms and legs, fighting their way into each other’s arms through a sea of uncooperative clothing.

  She shivered, her breasts flattened in the thicket of hair on his warm chest, swelling as he traced them with his thumbs while they kissed.

  “When are you going to marry me?” he whispered into her open mouth.

  “Whenever...you like,” she managed unsteadily.

  “Friday?”

  “That’s only three days away,” she said huskily.

  He smiled against her mouth. “I know.” He lifted his head and looked down where her body was lying across his lap, her torso bare against his. “And not a minute too soon.” He tugged at her lower lip with his teeth, in a sensual throbbing fantasy that made him dizzy. “Make a baby with me, Allison,” he whispered, easing her down onto the sofa as he lifted his head to hold her hazel eyes in thrall. “Here. Now.”

  “Gene...!” she exclaimed when he moved.

  But it was already too late for second thoughts, because he joined them with a minimum of fuss and smiled gently into her shocked eyes as he began to move sensually and with expert knowledge of her body.

  “Yes, that’s it,” he whispered when she ground her teeth together and gasped. “Only don’t cry out when I satisfy you,” he added with a slow, sensual smile, “because the walls aren’t that thick and the door isn’t locked. Do you hear me? Bite my chest or kiss me when it happens, so that the sound doesn’t penetrate the walls. God, you’re noisy,” he whispered as she began to bite back the sounds. “One day I’ll make love to you deep in the woods and you can scream for me. Yes. Yes. That’s it, lift up to me.” His hands gripped her hips and pulled her to him in a ragged, rough rhythm. “Yes. Yes!” His eyes closed and he began to shudder, then they opened straight into hers and his body impaled her fiercely. She felt the spiraling rhythm explode into ecstasy and rocked her slender body.

  “I want a son!” he bit off in her ear, and his hands clenched on her hips and ground her into him as he shuddered against her.

  It was the most unbelievable pleasure she’d ever shared with him. He collapsed against her and she clung to him, trembling in the aftermath.

  “God, that was good,” he whispered hoarsely at her ear. His arms contracted, riveting her to him. “Did you hear what I said, just at the last?”

  “Yes.” She drew him closer. “You whispered that you wanted a son,” she said, shivering.

  “I meant it. A son. A daughter. Our child.” He lifted his head and searched her eyes, his sweaty hair hanging down onto his broad forehead, his green eyes glittery with spent pleasure. “It’s exciting to make love like this. I never wanted children before. But it’s all I think about when I’m with you.”

  She reached up and touched his mouth. “I can never say no to you,” she whispered. “It’s...frightening.”
>
  “It’s your inhibitions,” he corrected. He kissed her softly and moved away, smiling indulgently at her embarrassment as she rearranged her clothing while he fastened his own. “Feverish, isn’t it?” he asked wickedly. “Hot and wild and out of control. You’re every dream I ever dreamed. I don’t know how I lived this long without you.”

  “Are you sure it isn’t just physical?” she asked after a minute, really worried.

  He brought her face up to his and kissed her gently. “If it was only physical, why would I want to make babies with you?” he whispered tenderly.

  She smiled, her heart in her eyes, and laid her head against his chest. “Then I’ll marry you whenever you say, Gene.”

  He hesitated. “There’s something I have to tell you, before you commit yourself,” he told her a minute later. “A secret I’ve held back. I should have told you before we ever got involved. I can’t ask you to live with me unless you know it.”

  She lifted her head. “It won’t matter. What is it?”

  “My father,” he began slowly, watching her face closely, “my real father, I mean...is in prison.”

  Her eyes didn’t waver. She smiled up at him. “I’m sorry about that. But what does it have to do with my marrying you?”

  He let out the breath he’d been holding. “My God,” he ground out. He caught her up roughly and held her close enough to bruise her, his eyes closed as he rocked her against him. “My God, I was scared to death to tell you...!”

  “But why?” she asked gently.

  “You might be afraid of our children inheriting bad blood,” he said curtly. “My father is a thief. From what I’ve been able to find out, he’s been in trouble with the law all his life.”

  She nuzzled her face against him, feeling warm and safe and secure. “Environment plays a big part in shaping a person’s character,” she said drowsily. “I get sleepy when you love me. Is that natural?”

  His breath caught. “When I love you,” he repeated in a slow whisper, feeling the words to his bones. His eyes closed and he held her closer, shivering. Love her. Love her. It was loving. Why hadn’t he realized it? “My God.”