Fire on the Plains (Western Fire) (17 page)

Determined to erase all of
his wife’s long-held memories, once and for all, Ben possessively slid his hands beneath her buttocks to hold her steady. More than anything else, he wanted Lydia to crave
his
kisses,
his
caresses,
his
body. And he especially wanted her to moan
his
name.

With a healthy measure of
manly pride, Ben watched Lydia begin to orgasm, her body straining, her lips parted. As she writhed beneath him, he continued to thrust deeply.
Hoping
. . .

Suddenly, Lydia’s neck gracefully arched, her breath little more than an erratic pant as she grabbed
hold of his upper arms.

“Ben!”

Certain that had to be the sweetest sound he’d ever heard, Ben’s seed burst from his body in a shuddering discharge. Choking back a strangled cry, he rigidly held himself on his forearms, trembling as he gulped much-needed air into his lungs. Then, drained of all his energy, he lowered himself onto his wife with a deep, satisfied sigh.

The moment had been a long time in coming.

“I’ve got to be honest with you, Lydia, eight years is a long time to go without.” While the topic was somewhat indelicate, given that he and his wife were tangled in the bed sheets, naked as newborns, Ben hoped that he could persuade her to speak freely. “Maybe it’s easier for women to—”

“It’s not,” Lydia
affirmed. “But without marital affection, it’s simply . . . simply a biological urge.”

Ben didn’t like to think how many times he’d given in to that particular urge since his first wife died twelve years ago.

Although, admittedly, her point was well taken. There was something immensely satisfying about laying abed with one’s wife, the air redolent with the musky scent of their spent passion. Rolling onto his side, Ben wedged a knee between Lydia’s thighs as he palmed a soft breast. He then bent his head and leisurely suckled her nipple. A few moments later, he scooted down the length of her body, nestling his head against her belly.

“Are you starting to feel any unladylike urges down there between your hips?”
he asked playfully.

Lydia blushed
furiously before she murmured, “One or two.”

That’s what I was hoping you’d say.

Spreading her knees apart, Ben wedged his shoulders between Lydia’s splayed legs. With a hand braced on each thigh, he blew a warm breath of air across her auburn curls.

“
Ben! W-what are you doing?”

Sliding his hands
to the juncture between her legs, Ben framed her damp folds with his two forefingers. “That first time was to make you my wife. Now I intend to make you my woman.”

“W-what does
that
mean?” Lydia warbled, unnerved by the fact that her husband’s head was in a place where she never expected it to be.

“I thought you might want me to pleasure you this way.”
Ben lowered his head, lightly flicking his tongue across the damp petals of her woman’s place.

Although the intimate caress lasted only a scant second,
Lydia shuddered, her hands clenching at the bed sheets as she struggled to catch her breath.

His gaze heavy-lidded, Ben unabashedly stared at her. “How about it, Mrs. Strong?
Would you like to give this a try?”

“It just seems so . . . so
shameless
,” she whimpered. Despite the protestation, already her body craved more.

“That it is, sweet woman. That it is. Now, why don’t you prop your head on those two
bed pillows,” Ben instructed, his eyes gleaming wickedly. “You might be interested in watching this.”

Her anticipation
quickly escalating, Lydia shoved the bed pillows under her neck. Admittedly, it was an obscene vantage point, viewing her husband from between her quivering breasts.

In wanton fascination, she watched as Ben
carefully pulled aside her wet folds, exposing her completely. For several seconds he did nothing more than gaze at her, his warm breath tormenting her to distraction before he began to lave her womanly juices, alternating between licking and sucking. With each shockingly intimate kiss, Lydia was hurled closer to the precipice, having lost control of her body the moment that Ben’s mouth touched her aching flesh.

Whimpering, she clamped her legs around her husband’s shoulders, the heels of her feet pushing against the taut muscles of his back
. Ben scooped his hands under her buttocks, lifting her closer, his tongue impudently thrusting into that most private of places. With his face burrowed between her legs, he rubbed his mouth, his nose,
oh, God
, his mustache, against her wet, throbbing bud.

With an agonized cry, Lydia
clutched at Ben’s head.

Unable to keep her climax at bay, she yielded to it, pushing herself against Ben’s mouth, the moment made all the more
intimate in that it was utterly free of shame.

Long minutes passed before Ben shoved himself to his knees.

Sweet Jesus. But I’ve got me one delectable woman.

Long-legged, big-bosomed, and so unknowingly provocative, she kept him in what seemed
a perpetual state of arousal. But even as he thought it, Ben acknowledged that there was far more to Lydia than that. There was something beautiful, and good, and fiercely maternal about her.

In truth, h
e’d married her because he wanted a woman beneath him at night. Which was well and good. Damn good, as it turned out. But he now wanted to keep her at his side, not only as a wife, but as a companion. A friend.
A lover
.

To his delight, Lydia kept her legs spread wide open, gracing
Ben with an unbelievably carnal sight. Unable to take his eyes off of that tempting pink juncture between her legs, he slowly inserted a finger into her, completely coating it with her body’s slick moisture.

Removing his finger, he pulled Lydia into a
seated position facing him. Smiling, he moved his wet finger toward her mouth, tempting her with it, waving it under her nostrils so that she could catch hold of the scent. Wide-eyed, she stared at him, a questioning look on her face.

To help
Lydia out of her quandary, Ben placed his other hand on the back of her head, holding her steady as he smeared the glistening residue over the surface of her lips.

“Go ahead and have a taste,” he
coaxed, his own excitement mounting at the sight of her lips painted with their mingled secretions.

When her tongue demurely flicked across her lower lip, he took the opportunity to wedge the tip
of his finger into her mouth.

“That’s what we smell like, what we taste like . . . me and you, Lydia.”

A look of pure wonder stole its way onto her face. Closing her eyes, his wife wrapped her hands around his wrist as she delicately sucked the remaining residue off his finger. It was an artlessly erotic sight, one that caused his rod to twitch against his belly.

“I want you to touch me, Lydia. Will you do that for me?”

Sensing that she was skittish, Ben gently took his wife by the hand and guided her to him, curling her fingers around his cock. At the first touch of that dainty hand on his swollen flesh, Ben groaned, his body shuddering. So many nights he’d lain awake, fantasizing about her touching him like this.

“I’m not certain what to do,” Lydia
confessed shyly.

“How about I show you?”

When she nodded her consent, Ben covered her hand with his, guiding her fingers up and down his painfully extended organ. As he taught her the rhythm that he liked best, he encouraged her with a hoarsely whispered command, a satisfied moan. Finally, he let his hand slip away, giving her free rein.

With Lydia’s fine handling of him,
Ben was fast on his way to climax. Tightly clenching his jaw, he struggled for control. A losing battle. All too soon, he began to shake convulsively as his warm seed spewed from his body. Lydia continued to slide her hand along his length, milking every last drop from him.

Barely able to move, he took hold of Lydia’s wrist and pulled her
into his arms. Exhausted, Ben closed his eyes.

Now t
hey were both sated. At least for the time being.

“How are we going to explain our prolonged absence to Walks Tall?”

Slipping the last button into its mooring, Lydia belatedly wished that Ben hadn’t tossed her gown onto the floor when he’d undressed her long hours ago. Creased and mussed, the green calico dress was now in dire need of a hot iron.

“No need to tell him anything,” Ben
said unconcernedly as he tugged a boot onto his foot. “One look at us and he’ll figure it out quick enough.” Wrinkling his nose, he sniffed his bare chest. “Hell, one whiff and—”

“Good heavens! We are his guests,” Lydia moaned. “To think that we abused his hospitality in such a . . . a flagrant manner
is unpardonable.” Self-consciously, she smoothed a hand over her coiffure, having hurriedly, and somewhat haphazardly, pinned it up.

Rising to his feet, Ben
grabbed her by the wrist, stilling her nervous hands. “It won’t do any good,” he murmured as he pulled her into the circle of his arms. “Besides, why do you think Walks Tall has been minding Dixie all day? Hmm? The minute he saw you saunter over to this wagon, he knew which way the wind was blowing.”

“Indeed
?”

“Uh
-huh.”

Angling his head, Ben leisurely rubbed his mouth against
Lydia’s, his tongue moistening her lips before he captured them in a deep, full-bodied kiss.

When he finally eased
away from her, Ben smiled, a look of manly satisfaction stamped onto his face. “Yes, indeed, Mrs. Strong. You have the unmistakable look of a well-loved woman.”

‘A well-loved woman.’

Although she knew that it was simply a figure of speech, Lydia couldn’t help but wonder as to her husband’s innermost feelings. True, they had spent the day in intimate congress with one another; but so far neither had spoken of their feelings for the other.

When, i
n the next instant, Ben suggestively slid his hands down her backside, Lydia pushed against his chest with the flat of her hand.

“You, sir, are endowed with a voracious appetite,” she scolded.

“Well, if I’m hungry, it’s because it took four whole weeks before I could finally sit down to the supper table.”

“After today’s –”
Lydia paused, searching for an appropriate word – “
banquet,
I would have thought you’d had your fill.”

“Think again,”
Ben smirked, playfully swatting her on the derriere before he plucked his shirt off of the floor.

Glancing
at the rumpled bed mattress, a heated blush stole over Lydia. For the last several hours, Ben had managed to coax from her a tumult of emotions that she’d never thought herself capable of feeling, let alone expressing. For too long, she’d hidden in the cloistered complacency of widowhood, more and more of her heart withering away with each passing year.