Rocky Mountain Wife (12 page)

Claire’s chest cinched up. “What are you doing out of bed, sweetheart? You’ve got school in the morning.”

“Is Gramma still here?” Hope lit her eyes.

“I’m afraid she’s gone home, but we can have her over for supper tomorrow. Would you like that?”

Ivy nodded, hiding a yawn behind her hand.

“Back to bed.” Claire smiled, ready to come and tuck the girl in again, but Ivy yawned harder, muttered good night and closed the door.

She was growing up too fast. It wasn’t that long ago when the girl would need to be read to so she could fall asleep. Claire wished she could freeze time and keep her little girl small. She wished she could go back to a place where she, Ivy and Clay were happy together. Another futile wish. Time kept turning, life took you forward and there was nothing you could do about it. Reluctantly, she stepped into her room and closed the door.

Loneliness flowed over her like a river. She lit the lamp and sat down on the edge of the bed, wishing she could hear the ring of Clay’s boots or hear the rustle of his clothes as he unbuttoned and removed his shirt. Honestly, it had been so long since he’d touched her, she could hardly remember the feel of his hands on her bare flesh. When he hadn’t been able to perform, he’d pulled away from all contact. He’d never touched her again. He’d never hugged her. He’d never kissed her.

Tonight it was the memory of Joshua’s kiss that burned on her lips, his kiss that had made her womb ache. She wanted Joshua, but how could she let herself have him? He may be her husband, but her heart would never accept him.

So, where did that leave her? She was torn between wanting the past and wanting to be loved,
needing
to be loved. Thinking of Joshua made her breath come faster and her womb contract, aching with need. Pent up need.

It was a natural thing. Just a physical thing. Nothing to worry about.

With the door locked, she turned the lamp’s wick down low. She unbuttoned her bodice and slipped out of her dress. Thunder cannoned in the far distance, a faint rumble that accompanied her as she loosened her stays and removed her corset. Topless in the dimmest light, she ran her hands over the quilted bedspread she’d made for her hope chest, dreaming of marrying Clay. His had been a long and sweet courtship. She smiled, fondly remembering, trying to will him back into the room and back into her life to no avail. The dead were gone, and that was something she just couldn’t face.

Just like she couldn’t accept the way her body jumped and pulsed, growing hot and wet in private places. She hated herself for it. She was ashamed of it. It was the worst kind of betrayal, wanting another man when Clay was gone.

But Clay
was
gone. Her heart roared with grief, and she closed off those feelings, stripping in the near dark. Who was she fooling? While Clay had loved her, and he most surely had, she had been alone in this room even when he’d been alive.

She pulled on her nightgown over her head and sat at the vanity, unpinning and then combing out her hair until it fell in rivers of gold. She squinted at her shadowy reflection in the beveled mirror, seeing the fine lines grief and worry had cut into her face. Her lips looked different. They were a deeper pink and bigger than usual, swollen from Joshua’s kiss.

That kiss.
She closed her eyes, reliving it. The perfect caress of his lips on hers, not soft but not too firm either. Just right, the seam of his lips fitting her top lip—his light suck, his sweeping brush, his sigh of excitement.

Stop remembering.
She opened her eyes, willing the image from her brain, but her lips, they remembered. Swearing to herself, she climbed into bed and pulled the covers over her.

Lonesomeness descended like a curse. She leaned back onto her pillow, listening to the stillness surrounding her. The storm had blown out. There was no rain, no hail, no crack of lightning, no thunder traveling across the sky.

Her body was restless. Joshua had stirred her up, no doubt about it. She was a woman in her prime, a woman with unmet needs. There was only one thing to do. She closed her eyes and tossed off the covers. Her breath caught as she drew up her nightgown, feeling the satin heat of her own inner thigh. Like she’d done for so many nights since Clay’s death, she ran her fingertips higher until the texture of her skin grew warm and softer.

Sensation zinged through her—that deep, heavy, sharp pleasure she’d missed so much. Sexual pleasure. If she closed her eyes, she could almost pretend Clay was there, the man she loved, tapping against that so sensitive spot hidden at the top of her swollen folds. Her breath caught, rasping in the shadows as she ran her fingertips lower, deeper. She was already wet, and she let her knees fall apart, forgetting everything but the sweep of pleasure across her intimate skin.

She pretended Clay was moving over her, his body hot and solid. The bump of his shaft against her thigh, the press of the blunt tip pushing her apart. She slipped two fingers inside, wishing, wanting it to be him, but instead of her blood heating, instead of losing control and feeling orgasm rush through her in a hot, pulsing squeeze, she went cold.

She withdrew her fingers and blew out a long breath. It felt wrong to be wanting like this and to be wanting what he could never give her again.

Every night ended like this. With her alone on her back with her thighs spread, the orgasm she wanted so badly slipping away from her, forever out of reach.

But one thing was different this night. Tonight she was wet. Very wet. Swollen.
Very
swollen. She bit back a groan realizing why. It was her reaction to Joshua. To his delectable kiss. To his virile, iron-strong body.

Why was she plagued with this sexual hunger for him? It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t what she wanted, and yet her fingers returned to stroke her secret, heated flesh. Her fingertips found the small, sensitive bud that began to ache.

Joshua’s image popped into her mind just as he’d sat beside her in the hayloft, leaning in to kiss her. It was his passionate, hungry kiss she imagined on her mouth. It was his sharp intake of air she heard as he murmured in her ear, saying how much he hungered for her. In her mind, she was in the barn again, and this time she didn’t push him away. She reached for his belt buckle, feeling the hard bulge against his trousers.

Bold now, she imagined him lifting her skirt, pushing her drawers aside and touching her there, where she was so wet. His fingers tapped on her tight, sensitive bud. Keen-edged pleasure cut through her, curling her toes.

“Yes,” she murmured, her back arching, her heels digging into the mattress. Her knees fell open for him as he moved over her, erect and desperate for her. Her entire body clenched as she slipped two fingers into her tight, pulsing channel imagining it was his shaft, his thickness moving inside her and she came with a fierce, lightning-bright jolt. She cried out, surprised at the swift, fierce throb of her inner muscles.

Reality returned, and she blinked, realizing she was alone in bed. Alone, fantasizing about another man. What kind of woman did that make her? She withdrew her fingers, pulled her nightgown into place and realized she was crying.

Joshua stared at the silhouette writhing in orgasm and stubbed his toe on a rock. He winced, ignoring the pain because he couldn’t force his gaze from the upstairs window of Claire’s house. Her form was backlit by the low glow of a lamp, painted in striking relief against the closed cotton curtains. She arched her back one final time before falling back to rest on the bed.

The light behind her showed her in perfect relief. The slope of her cute nose, the cut of her chin, the graceful line of her throat—and as his eyes slid lower, he focused on the round globes of her breasts jutting upward and her slender, parted thighs. Then she slid her legs together and rolled onto her side.

Realizing he’d been staring and that he was as hard as an iron pole, he cleared his throat and turned around.

He’d wanted to check on the clouds overhead, to make sure there were no more ominous storms headed their way before turning in. The wind breezed over him, cool on his skin, and he tried—hell, he tried everything he knew—to get that image of Claire masturbating out of his head. His blood was hot, his cock rigid, and he had to fist his hands to resist the urge to reach out to her, as if she were flesh and blood right there in front of him.

He turned around, stared at the horses snoozing in their paddock near the barn, but Claire’s image remained emblazoned on the back of his eyelids. Hell, how was he ever going to forget that?

He felt bad for staring at her in a private moment, but he couldn’t deny he was aroused. Likely she would always have that effect on him. Frustrated, he swept off his hat and let the wind blow through his hair. Keeping his back firmly turned so he wouldn’t be tempted to take another peek at her upstairs window, he walked through the pitch black fields towards home.

Christ, he’d never seen such a thing. Well, outside of a whorehouse. Oliver Sanders lowered his binoculars and whipped off his hat before the rising winds could steal it. Shit, that was not what he expected to see from prim and dainty little Claire’s bedroom window. He’d been only checking to see exactly how married she and that good-for-nothing Joshua Reed were, that’s all. What a surprise—Claire in all her glory, silhouetted erotically, writhing in the kind of pleasure a man dreamed about.

Yeah, he’d been right to think she’d be naughty, down deep. He liked thinking that maybe what he wanted to do to her—how hard and rough he wanted to take her—might make her aroused too. Unlike his prude of a wife who wept through her duty to him. Bitch. Sourness rolled into his mouth, and he spit into the grasses on the rise of the hill overlooking the Callahan ranch. He still thought of it as the Callahan place, because Joshua Reed wouldn’t own it for long.

Oliver smirked. Yeah, he’d see to that.

In the field behind him, one of his cattle stirred. He had three hundred cow-calf pairs and he was outgrowing the fields he had. He needed more. He stared down at his limp cock, stretched and sated from a few quick tugs. He’d come when Claire did, imagining her screams of pain and imagining her liking it when he did her violent like that. He had a little cum on his hand and wiped it in the grass, wondering if he had another erection in him. Maybe.

He stared at Claire’s curtains, which had gone black, and imagined her lying there naked just for him, urging him to do to her everything he secretly desired. He was a wealthy man now, a big landowner in this county. Why shouldn’t he have what he wanted?

And he wanted Claire. He wanted to treat her like the little whore she was.

He’d take her, and then he would take her land.

He felt his cock kick as it thickened. He wrapped his hand around the base and squeezed hard, thinking of her.

Claire woke with a start. By the time she’d washed, dressed, woke Ivy and started breakfast, a cloud-veiled sun was up and shining wanly through her kitchen windows. It felt muggy from last night’s storm, so she opened the windows and let the breeze ruffle the curtains. She caught sight of a man in the fields, planting the freshly furrowed soil, his back bent to his work.

Respect for him filled her. How long had he been at it this morning? Her future—and her land—was in good hands.

“Ma!” Ivy bounded into the room, scrubbed clean and wearing her adorable purple calico dress and matching frock. Her hair was down and carefully brushed. She held up her comb and hair ribbons. “I’ve got on my lucky dress ‘cuz it’s the spelling bee today.”

“Are you nervous?” Claire lifted the last slice of bacon from the fry pan to drain and set the pan off the stove. She pulled out a kitchen chair for Ivy.

“Sorta. I’ve studied up on all the words, but sometimes I get flubbered.” Ivy plopped into the chair, surrendering the comb. She set the ribbons on the table.

“I used to do that in school, too.” Claire used the comb to part the girl’s hair exactly down the middle and then into thirds to start the braid. “I would know the word perfectly, except when the teacher called my name, and then I would forget it. I would get nervous.”

“Me, too.” Ivy sighed, swinging her legs.

“You’ll be fine. Just don’t get nervous like I did.” Claire looked up from her braiding. Joshua was still in the fields, a distant figure. Remembering what she’d done last night made her face burn. She’d come so hard, imagining making love to him. That was no way to behave! She concentrated hard on Ivy’s hair and on getting the braids just right. “You know the words. Just think of that and you’ll do fine. You are the best speller I know.”

“Me, too. Except when it comes to the spelling bees.” Ivy blew out a troubled sigh. “Ma? How come that man keeps planting our field? Did you hire him?”

“Not exactly.” This was not the conversation she wanted to have, and especially not now. Ivy had a big day at school with her spelling bee. It wasn’t fair to distract her. “But it’s something like that. He has promised to help us for a long time.”

“Like Gramma does, only in the field instead of the house?”

“Yes.” Claire considered how to tell Ivy about the wedding, but the words didn’t come. Maybe because it was another step to admitting that Clay was being replaced. First as a caretaker to the ranch and then as a father. She finished the first braid and tied the purple ribbon neatly at the end. “Mr. Reed is letting us use Harold.”

“But you sold Harold to him.”

“Yes. But this way I can drive you to school this morning.” She didn’t know why her gaze strayed to the window. Her fingers worked automatically, braiding and tying the second ribbon into place as she watched the well-built man bend over, dropping seeds into the furrow and patting dirt over them with capable patience.

Was that the way he made love to a woman?
The inappropriate thought darted into her head and took hold, refusing to let go. His kiss had been unrushed and tender. Would his touch be the same way, tracing over her skin, over her breasts?

Her body quivered, and she turned to the stove, trembling. She didn’t like this attraction for Joshua. It was growing in strength and, worse, she couldn’t control it.