This Side of Heaven (29 page)

“Stop that, you,” she said sternly, and pointed the
nuisance of an animal outside. When he went, head and tail drooping, she rolled the door shut behind him. At the moment she had no patience to waste on that buffoon of a dog.

When Caroline turned back from shutting the door, it was to find Matt scowling at her. He was still rubbing his knee, but the gesture was almost absent-minded, as if his thoughts, focusing elsewhere, had little room for the pain or its easing.

“Shall I do that for you?” she asked, moving across the straw-over-packed-earth floor to his side.

“No.” Matt’s answer was rude in its brevity, but Caroline paid no attention to it, instead sinking to her knees and taking over from him quite naturally. It was a task she had performed before. When he had started using the crutches, and then the cane, as his leg healed, the extra weight on his lame leg had caused it to cramp with pain. But massaging eased it, and she seemed to have a particular knack. Even as he repulsed her with words, his hands grudgingly moved aside to let her take over the work.

For a moment, unspeaking, she kneaded the knee and the knotted thigh muscles above it much as she would have a loaf of bread. Even through the coarse homespun of his breeches, she could feel the heat of his skin. His thigh was hard and muscular and masculine, and she instinctively registered the feel of it as she worked to bring him ease.

“What do you want?” he asked again, no less hostile than before. As she glanced up from her careful attention to his knee, she saw that he was speaking through his teeth.

“Why, what should I want in the barn at this hour of the night? To talk to you, of course.”

“Did they put you up to it?”

Caroline smiled a little, then turned her gaze back to his knee. “Of course. None of them dared face you. Except Daniel, and he was all for punching you in the teeth.”

“Was he, by God! I’d like to see him try it!” Matt sounded so bloodthirsty that Caroline’s hopes were increased. She looked up at him again, seeing if she could find anything in his face that might give her more encouragement.

“Brothers should not fight,” she said, studying him. By the light of the single lantern that was set into a hook in a nearby support beam, he looked tired, tough, and so handsome that he nearly stole her breath.

“Cain and Abel did,” Matt answered grimly.

“Yes, and look what came of it! Besides, you and Daniel are ordinarily the best of friends.”

Matt grunted. Beneath her hands, Caroline could feel the easing of his thigh muscles, and she shifted her attention lower, to the knee itself and the stockinged calf below it.

“Davey was shocked to hear you send your brother to perdition,” she told the knee. Her fingers found the hollows on either side of his kneecap, and she concentrated on massaging them while she waited for what he would say. “He has never heard you speak so before, he said.”

“I should not have done that, especially before the children. I’m ashamed of myself, and I’ll explain to Davey and apologize for it,” he said heavily.

“But you were provoked.”

“Aye, I was.”

“By Daniel.”

“Aye.”

Caroline’s hands stilled, and she looked up at him. She was kneeling now between his legs, half leaning against his sound thigh as her hands did their work on the other. She did not know it, but the lantern light turned her eyes beneath the silky black slashes of her brows to deepest yellow and emphasized the lovely planes and angles of her face, from her high cheekbones to her softly rounded chin. Her hair, black as midnight, was pulled simply back from a center part into a thick coil at her nape. The plain black and white of her dress might have been dreary on anyone else, but on Caroline it was superb. The fabric molded itself to her curves that were still slender but also round in a most womanly fashion, and the stark coloring echoed the tones of her hair and skin. She looked outrageously beautiful as she glanced up at Matt, and his mouth as well as all his muscles tightened in response.

“Why is that, I wonder?” She felt the stiffening of his thigh under her hands, and moved her fingers against the taut muscle. The wool of his breeches was rough to her touch. Beneath the cloth his leg was smooth and hard.

“What are you asking me, Caroline?” His eyes were hooded as they met hers.

“ ’Tis no great mystery, is it? I am merely asking you why, after all these years of harmonious living, your brother should suddenly provoke you past all bearing?” If the words and tone were innocent, her
intent was not. Her fingers smoothed the cloth, stroked up his thigh and then down again.

“Why? You want to know why?” His words were almost fierce. Without warning, his hands moved to cover and still hers, flattening them against his thigh. The size and strength of his hands as they rested over her own much smaller ones sent a flicker of heat racing along her spine. Arrested, she savored the sensation and the quickening in her loins that accompanied it. After months of cultivating a somnolent peace, it was surprising to find herself being jolted into quivering life again.

He started to say more, hesitated, and scowled at her.

“If ’tis your intention to wed Daniel, then you have no business being out here with me. I suggest you get up from there and hustle yourself back inside.”

“I’m most fond of Daniel,” Caroline replied with a pensive air. Her heart leaped at the sudden blue blaze that her admission caused to flare to life in his eyes.

“Are you indeed?” He bit off the words.

“And I believe he is fond of me as well. But he has not asked to wed me.”

“He will.”

“If he does, then I shall just have to—refuse.” She smiled a little, and turned her hands so that her fingers sought and intertwined with his. “ ’Tis not Daniel I have an eye to.”

“Isn’t it?”

“No.” Emboldened by what she thought she saw in his gaze, she freed her hands and rose up on her knees so that her face was on a level with his. Her hands
rested on his wide shoulders, while his, automatically, she thought, sought and found the slenderness of her waist. His eyes glittered into hers, restless and very blue.

“ ’Tis you,” she continued softly.

At that his eyes narrowed, while his hands tightened on her waist. Something that was far too intense to be termed a smile twisted his mouth, was gone.

“Are you making me a declaration, by any chance?” Underneath the deliberate lightness with which he tried to imbue the words, there was a wary note.

The heat that shimmered to life between them made speech increasingly difficult, but Caroline forced the words past her tight throat.

“And if I am?” she asked, her breath catching and holding as she waited, waited for his reply.

“I take leave to warn you that you are living dangerously.” He was still striving for lightness, but his eyes, deep blue and hungry, said far more than his words.

“Indeed?” Uttering more than the single word was beyond her. Her hands shifted of their own accord along his shoulders, savoring the feel of the thick muscles through the shirt she had made. “And just what does that mean, pray?”

Matt looked at her for a long moment without answering, his face dark and his eyes restless. Then he laughed, a short, harsh sound that had nothing of amusement in it. “What does that mean, my poppet? Are you sure you want to know? But I’m going to tell you, since you’ve asked, whether you want to hear it or not. It means that you’ve been a raging fever in my blood for months. I can’t think, I can’t work, I lie
awake nights going mad with wanting you. Is that enough to send you flying back to the house, or do you want to hear more?”

Caroline said nothing, but she made not the slightest move that might indicate incipient flight. Her eyes locked with his, and her breathing stopped.

“I burn for you.” His voice was low and rough. “My flesh aches and throbs in a constant torment that must surely rival the tortures of hell. I can conceive of no surcease but that of easing myself in your flesh—yet I would not hurt you, or frighten you. So run away now, while you’ve still the chance. Or I warn you, you may sorely regret the outcome of this night’s work.”

“I am not afraid of you, Matt.” It was the merest whisper, and not quite true. While she was not afraid of the man, she was afraid of the voracious passion that he held on so fragile a leash. She was afraid of what might happen when the quivering taut string that held him like that which strung a bow snapped.

“Are you not?” His eyes, dark with need yet blazing too, moved to her lips. “Then kiss me, Caroline.”

It was a ragged taunt. Caroline’s breath caught in her throat, and for a moment she hesitated. But he was hers for the asking now, she knew. She needed only to lean close and meet his challenge. Her eyes never left his face as she swayed toward him, sliding her arms around his neck. Her gaze was as intense as though she would commit his image to memory for now and forever. Only as their mouths touched did her lids flicker shut.

His lips were warm and surprisingly soft beneath hers. For just a moment he remained motionless, letting
her feel the heat that arose from the simple meeting of their mouths. Then his hands shifted, sliding around her waist, and he pulled her close.

“Oh, Matt!”

She breathed his name even as she was crushed against his chest and he opened his lips over hers. His hand was on the back of her head, tilting it and positioning her mouth for his taking. Her lips had parted instinctively; his tongue slid inside, filling the warm wet cavity, claiming and taming it. The last time he had kissed her thus, he had gotten so far and no further before she had panicked. But this time, because he was Matt and she loved him, she forced from her mind the images of the past that rushed forth and concentrated instead on him: on Matt.

“You taste so sweet.”

He was still holding himself back, withdrawing from the deep melding of their mouths as he pressed rousing little kisses to her lips, murmuring to her, gentling her so that she would not take fright. Caroline felt him reining himself in, and the knowledge that he cared enough for her to do so melted the last of the barriers that she had erected between them. In a sudden glorious burst of loving generosity she tightened her arms around his neck, pressed her body to his, and slid her tongue between his teeth. She would give herself to him, anything he wanted without restraint, because she loved him. He was more to her than the whole world.

“Caroline.” He pulled back, sounding as if he were drowning. His breathing was uneven, his face flushed. She could feel the struggle he was having to hang on to
his control. “If you kiss me like that again. I’m likely to lose my head.”

“I want you to lose your head,” she whispered against his mouth and, tilting her chin, fitted her lips to his again. This time, when her tongue touched his, he gasped. Then he gave her no quarter but crushed her closer, his mouth slanting over hers, his heart slamming against her breasts.

Even as he kissed her with hungry need he half rolled, half fell off the bucket, taking her down with him to the floor where he wrapped his arms around her and slid his legs over hers and let her feel the whole long hard length of him against her body. She tightened her arms around him and shut her eyes and held him close, not protesting when his trembling fingers found and fondled her breasts even though the ghastly memories were once again fighting to surface. But she held them at bay by repeating to herself, over and over, “This is Matt.” Even when his hands slid down her legs to jerk at her skirt, she did not try to stop him, but clung to him as he yanked her dress and petticoat up around her waist and fumbled at his own breeches until his buttons popped with his urgency.

When he parted her stocking-clad legs with his knee she gritted her teeth. When he found the part of her that had been hurt before and that he would hurt again she sank her nails in his shoulders in grim acquiescence. When he pushed himself inside her, stretching her and filling her until she thought she must burst, she trembled with the horror that broke over her in waves as she could no longer hold it at bay. Yet still she held him, eyes shut, teeth clenched, and uttered
not so much as a single sound of protest as, with hoarse sounds of ecstasy, he thrust himself inside her again and again.

Against her bare backside she felt the prickle of straw and cold earth. Over her and in her was the hard strength of groaning, heaving man. Her hands clutched his back, bunching his shirt in her fists, and her toes curled in her shoes as she resisted with every scrap of willpower she possessed the urge to fight what he was doing to her. He was Matt, her Matt, and she loved him. By this act he made her his. Clinging to that thought, she endured.

When he finished, with a great cry and a thrust so deep that she whimpered before she could stop herself at the ferocity of it, she held him as he collapsed shuddering atop her. She held him and stroked his hair and tried not to think of his body still wedged inside hers, or her soreness, or his seminakedness, or hers. Such thoughts would bring on shudders of disgust, she knew, instead, as her hands smoothed over his shoulders and caressed his back, she concentrated on the certainty that she had pleased him enormously with her gift. As she had thought it would, that notion made the violation of her body far easier to bear.

Until, at last, he raised himself on his elbows so that he could stare down into her face. Looking up at him with a loving smile, she was stunned by the harshness she saw there.

“Damn you!” He gritted the words out even as his body tensed atop hers. “Why the hell didn’t you stop me?”

31

“W
hy—why should I have stopped you?” Her eyes were huge with confusion and shock as they met his. He was clearly angry, his bright blue gaze narrowed and hard, his mouth set in an uncompromising line. Before tonight she had never heard him use such deliberate profanity, but he was suddenly making up with a vengeance for his normal temperateness. Even his body with its rigid muscles emanated hostility. Though why, when she had practically sundered herself in two to give him the dearest gift she had to give, he should be angry with her was beyond her ken.