Unbound Pursuit (3 page)

“Do you like
my old room?” Wyatt asked Tal as he threw their four pieces of luggage onto his antique full bed. It had a brass head- and footboard that had been recently polished. Wyatt would have bet anything that his mother had done it.

Tal looked around. The two-story adobe brick home was huge and square, sitting out in the middle of a flat plain, with the Guadalupe Mountains rising north of the spread. “Cozy,” she murmured, running her fingertips over the large, light tan exposed bricks, which had been handmade with mud and straw a hundred years ago. Wyatt’s room was up on the second floor, at the south end of the home. His parents’ bedroom was on the first floor. The other three bedrooms, plus two bathrooms, comprised the second floor.

Wyatt smiled a little. There were two dressers in the room, and he opened the top drawer of an antique oak one, starting to place Tal’s lingerie, socks, and long-sleeved tees in it. “Look around. Snoop. Maybe you’ll discover something new about me.”

She smiled in return and saw all the GI Joe figurines on one oak shelf on the wall. On another shelf were military toys such as combat jets, an Abrams tank, an Apache combat helo, and other model aircraft. “It looks like you were planning on going into the military since you were a kid,” she murmured. Tal noticed books on another shelf. She saw Ernest Hemingway novels,
All
Quiet on the Western Front
by Erich Maria Remarque, and others. That was serious reading for a young boy. “Did you understand what you read?” she asked, pointing to the hardback books.

Looking up, Wyatt nodded his head. “My family is a bunch of book readers by nature. There’s a secondhand bookstore in town. My dad would take all us kids over there on a Saturday afternoon, and we’d troll through the tables full of books. I was always drawn to action and adventure books. I was eight and bought the five Hemingway books for a dollar with the allowance money I’d earned. I had treasures in my hands,” he said, meeting her smile.

“That’s pretty hefty reading for an eight-year-old,” she murmured, touching the spine of
For Whom the Bell Tolls
.

Wyatt quickly emptied the suitcase, shutting it up and placing it beneath his bed. “Yeah, my dad warned me about that. They weren’t kids’ books.”

“What did you get out of this one?” Tal pulled out another Hemingway book, holding it up so he could see the title.

“Oh, that one,” he groused, setting Tal’s second piece of luggage up on his bed and opening it. “It’s a love story between an ambulance driver and a nurse. Have you read it?”

“Yes, when I was fourteen.”

He quirked an eyebrow, amusement in his expression. “Kinda young for that sort of heavy reading, weren’t you?”

Her lips curved upward as she settled it back on the shelf. “I cried at the end of it.”

“Yeah, to lose the person you love is hell,” Wyatt grunted, giving her a more than meaningful look. “Finding you out there on that ridge, with those trees looking like strewn toothpicks that had been tossed up in the air and fallen all round you, didn’t exactly make my day, either.”

“No, but I don’t remember any of it, thank God,” she said. Wyatt was quick and efficient, placing her jeans, sweaters, and other shirts neatly into the two top drawers of the other dresser. “What are you doing? Why don’t you put all my clothes in one dresser, Wyatt?”

He straightened and came over to where she stood by the shelf. Sliding his arms around her waist, gently drawing her against him, his rasped against her temple, “Because I don’t want you have to crouch or kneel down with that ankle of yours, the way that it is right now, that’s why.”

Her heart filled with love for the man. He was so sensitive and aware, but she knew a lot of that was probably ingrained in him by the SEALs. He’d been trained to pay close attention to all details. She lifted her chin, meeting and pressing her lips against his mouth. The door to his room was closed, so she knew she could be affectionate with him up to a point. Hearing Wyatt growl, that reverberation going through his powerful chest, her breasts tingling at the vibration, nipples puckering, Tal slid her lips against his. Breathing changing, feeling her lower body come online like it always did any time they kissed or touched one another in a loving way, Tal surrendered to his tall, strong form. He would hold her. He wouldn’t let her slip out of his embrace. Wyatt was like a rock wall: unmoving, stable. Forever.

Drowning in the heat of his mouth, feeling his heartbeat rise beneath her breasts, his hands feathering up and down her back, cupping her cheeks, pulling her firmly against him, she moaned. His cock was thick and hard against the zipper of his jeans. Juices were spilling down through her channel, and she made a low sound of pleasure as his tongue slowly tangled with hers.

Rubbing against her pelvis, he growled as his hands held her prisoner in the most delicious of ways.

There was a light knock at Wyatt’s bedroom door.

Dazed, Tal eased away from him. He gave her a look of apology.

“To be continued later,” he promised thickly, releasing her but keeping his hand on her arm to make sure she was stable after the hot, burning kiss that had ignited between them.

Tal stepped back, feeling dampness gathering between her thighs. “You’re
such
a tease, cowboy,” she whispered, grinning at him as he went to answer the door.

“You’ll find out just how much of one I am,” he promised her, his gray eyes stormy with lust.

T
al loved the
Lockwoods’ huge L-shaped kitchen. It had a long, rectangular oak table, a shiny patina on it indicating it had probably been in the family for the hundred years since their house had been built. Daisy, Mattie, and Cathy were in the kitchen, and when Tal tried to offer her help, they all told her to go sit down at the table. Okay, orders were orders. She saw Wyatt grin a little as he pulled out one of the oak chairs for her. On each seat was a colorful quilted pad. Tal thanked him and sat down next to him.

“Mom gets persnickety about who’s in her kitchen,” Wyatt admitted, folding his hands.

“I’d be an elephant in the room if I tried to help them,” Tal admitted. “But I had to ask. That’s only good manners.”

“It is,” he agreed with a nod. “And I know my mother appreciates your thoughtfulness. But you don’t need one of those fillies in there stepping on that boot of yours by mistake, do you?” He raised one brow.

Giving him a sour look, Tal muttered unhappily, “No . . .”

He leaned back and placed his arm across the back of Tal’s chair. “Hey, we’re on vacation, darlin’, start acting like it, huh?” he teased her unmercifully.

Tal agreed that she’d had that coming. “Okay, I’ll try.” She wasn’t taking good care of herself, as she should have been doing.

The table had been set to perfection with cut-glass salt and pepper shakers, quilted placemats, glasses that Tal thought might be at least from the 1940s. The silver flatware, which had a delicate floral design on the handles, had been lovingly polished. The whole house was like a time capsule as far as Tal was concerned. She was a bit of an antique lover, and in the living room she had spotted a piano that had to be from around 1900, hand-carved oak rockers, plus a green velvet settee that was surely from the late 1800s. She was dying to talk to Daisy about all the furniture because she loved the layers of history in their home. It was as if each generation who lived there had added some thoughtful pieces of furniture or décor for the next generation to use and enjoy.

“I really like your home, Wyatt. I love that it has so many antiques in it.”

He chuckled. “Thank God you aren’t calling me an antique yet.”

Tal burst out laughing.

All the women in the kitchen turned their heads in unison, as if they’d rehearsed the move a hundred times before.

“Oh,” Wyatt drawled to them, “the woman I’m gonna marry is callin’ me an antique like what we have in our house here, Mom.”

Heat shot into Tal’s cheeks. She gasped, giving Wyatt an incredulous look. “I did not!” she protested loudly, giving him a severe, reproachful stare.

Wyatt gave her that boyish, innocent look he always did when he was up to no good.

Daisy chortled, drying her hands at the sink. “You gotta watch Wyatt, Tal. He’ll box you into a corner like a good quarter horse will corner a cow.”

Giving Tal a smug look, Wyatt said, “But you love me anyway? Antique or not?”

Tal gave him a dirty look. “You know I do. You are
such
an adversarial person!”

Mattie crowed. “Oh, yes he is! You should have grown up with him, Tal. He used to pull all kinds of pranks on Cathy and me just so he could hear us squeal.”

Cathy, who was closest, wearing a red apron around her waist, picked up a long wooden spoon, waving it warningly in Wyatt’s direction. “Tal, I think what I’m going to do is go to Hickman’s Hardware Store in Van Horn before you leave. You’re going to need one of these to whop that guy of yours alongside the head from time to time when he starts being an unmerciful pest. Stop it before it starts.”

Wyatt sat up, his grin widening enormously, his delighted gaze on his sister. “Hey, Cat, are you gonna tie it up with a red ribbon for her?”

That brought a howl out of the other two women.

Cathy blushed red. “Ohh, okay, I get it. Gloves off. Fair enough. The war is on.” She waved the spoon menacingly in his direction again.

Tal didn’t know what to think. Daisy and Mattie were bent over laughing so hard they were crying. Cathy looked absolutely embarrassed. She heard Wyatt next to her, chuckling indulgently, a big, satisfied cat smile all over his face, like he’d just stolen all the cream. He looked at her with feigned innocence she knew he didn’t have.

Twisting back a look at Cathy, Tal felt sorry for her. “What’s this all about?” she asked her, keeping a sympathetic expression on her face.

Growling under breath, Cathy went back to peeling the potatoes in the sink with quick, skilled movements. “When I was eight years old, I still believed in Santa Claus. Being the big mouth that I am, and so sure of myself, I went around telling everyone that Santa existed. Now, no one said he did or didn’t. Wyatt kept saying it was a myth. A legend. And I just didn’t want to hear it. When I went to sleep in my room, Wyatt snuck in there with a huge roll of red ribbon that Mom was going to use to wrap packages for Christmas. I never heard him. When I woke up the next morning, Wyatt had ‘papered’ my bed. I had a hundred feet of red ribbon tied from one post to another across my bed.

“I was so excited about the ribbon that I ran downstairs to tell Mom and Dad that Santa had visited me last night. Wyatt was down there with them and he started laughing.” Cathy gave him an evil look. “And that’s when I realized he’d done it.”

Daisy wiped her eyes and went over to hug her daughter. “I’m sorry, honey, I couldn’t help myself. It
was
funny in one way, but in another way, it wasn’t.”

“Which,” Hank Lockwood said as he came down the hall from the office, “is why Wyatt got his butt tanned out in the woodshed for that mean prank he played.”

“Rightly so,” Tal agreed, giving Wyatt a really dark look. “That was mean of you to do that to Cathy. Children should be allowed to have their dreams and fantasies, Wyatt. How could you?”

Wyatt gave her a hangdog look. “It was,” he confessed. “I’ve pulled a lot of jokes on family members, but that wasn’t one of my finer moments.”

Hank went into the kitchen, his height and bulk dwarfing the area. “Actually,” he said, “it was the only time you got your butt paddled, son.” He rolled up the sleeves on his shirt and then washed his hands in the sink.

Wyatt grinned, perking up as he held Tal’s accusing green stare. “See? I learned. Butt paddled only once. That’s a pretty good track record considering how many jokes I played on my poor siblings.”

Cathy smiled. “Mom rescued me from your joke.”

“Yeah,” Wyatt grumbled, “by telling a lie.”

“Now, Wyatt,” Daisy warned, shaking her finger in his direction, “it was a
white
lie. There’s a difference.”

“Sure is,” Cathy agreed. She shifted her focus to Tal. “Mom lied and told me that only children who had been especially good in the last year were given the gift of red ribbons by Santa himself. It was his way of saying I’d been a really good girl all year long.”

Wyatt snorted. “I know where I got my storytellin’ from.” He waved his finger in the direction of his smiling mother, who was drying her hands on her dark green apron.

“Yes, son, you did,” Daisy agreed amiably.

“Do you know what else they did to me for playing that dirty trick on Cathy?” Wyatt asked Tal.

“I feel like all the family skeletons are coming out of the closet, Lockwood. And you probably own ninety percent of ’em,” she murmured, a grin edging her lips.

“I love a woman who gives as good as she gets,” Wyatt said, leaning forward and kissing Tal’s cheek.

“Go on,” Cathy goaded, smirking, “tell her, Wyatt. What
else
happened to you that day? Five days before Christmas, I might add.”

Wyatt’s grin grew, and he looked at Tal. “I woke up the next morning and sitting next to my pillow was this gunnysack. I never heard anyone come into my room to put it there, but it was there when I woke up. Of course I was curious, so I jumped out of bed. It was a hundred-pound oat gunnysack, and there was something in the bottom of it. It was wrapped up in twine, so I quickly untied it, excited. I thought it was a gift of some kind.”

Cathy snickered. Daisy and Mattie began to laugh uncontrollably again, bent over, hands on their knees.

Tal frowned. “What was it?”

Hank ambled over to the table with his long, casual stride. “Somethin’ real special for a firstborn son to learn from,” he rumbled, a sour grin on his face as he pulled out the chair at the end of the table and sat down. “Tell her, son.”

Tal saw ruddiness coming to Wyatt’s cheeks. He rarely blushed, but he did now. And there was some humility in his expression. “What was it?” she asked.

“A bucket of coal.”

Tal blinked. And then she got it: coal in the sock at Christmas for kids who were not good. And then she started howling right along with Daisy and Mattie.